On December 28, 2022, shortly before that, GEO 186 appeared without any debate, which establishes taxation of excess profits in the field of oil, gas and coal production, the main target of which is OMV Petrom.

The tax applied to all companies in this sector. But the way GEO 186/2022 is written means that it is the target company that does not fall under the terms of the law regarding excessive taxation! The ROMGAZ company became an undoubted victim of the law!

Again the state made a wide

The accusations against the company are baseless because it complies with the law. There is no question that OMV Petrom does not want to pay, the LAW says it is not obligated to pay.

GEO 186/2022 provides for the obligation to pay the solidarity contribution for the financial year 2022, if at least 75% of the turnover comes from the following sectors: crude oil production, natural gas production, oil production and production of products obtained from oil refining.

According to the preliminary financial results for 2022, in 2022 OMV Petrom has less than 75% turnover in the sectors defined in GEO 186/2022.

It is true that after the appearance of Regulation 1854/2022 on October 6, 2022, many companies that worked in the fields of: crude oil production, natural gas production, oil production and the production of products obtained as a result of oil processing, started mass activities in the period October-December 2022 in other sectors of activity besides these, for example, trade, production and sale of electricity, etc., precisely in order not to achieve that 75% of the turnover is carried out from the areas provided for by law.

Any unexpected surplus must be partially returned to the community that generated the surplus

It is wrong that excess profits go only to shareholders (regardless of whether the shareholding is public or private), but also that they turn into excess taxes and are lost in the black holes of the state budget (in 2013, retaxation of profits from the gas sector was introduced with to protect vulnerable consumers, but the money was spent, and vulnerable consumers did not benefit from these funds for 10 years).

We understand that the provisions of the law regarding the obligation to reinvest excess profits and only in a situation where this does not lead to excessive taxation of companies, such a construction can establish the obligation to apply regardless of turnover and will have more companies involved in these constructions.

Such a construction would be a win-win (citizens – state – companies). Citizens – because they would have access to products that are not produced in Romania today or are not produced in sufficient quantities, are imported and therefore have higher prices. State – as stability and national security increased, new enterprises appeared that create taxes and fees for the state budget. Companies – the existence of a greater demand than the supply of energy still determined the need for investments in the energy sector, which brought new future profits.

Example: We are one of the few countries with oil refining capacity that exports used cooking oil to produce biofuel, which we then import at high prices. A law on excessive taxation could determine the orientation of surplus profits to the development of biofuel production capacities.

In a situation where refineries invest at least 80% of the excess profit obtained in 2022, the state can offer VAT exemption for these investments made and thus develop the biofuel production sector in Romania. Starting this year, the share of biofuels among the types of fuel used will increase. It was a way of economic growth and lower gasoline prices that are bought by those who contributed to those excess profits – the people.

N. Ed: Dumitru Chisalita is the president of the Association of Intellectual Energy