Portuguese bank Millennium, part of the BCP Group, will sell its Romanian subsidiary, as part of a group-restructuring plan. The sale is part of the commitments the group made to the European Commission.

In Romania, Millennium bank has less than 1 percent market share. The bank ended the first half of 2013 with a loss of EUR 3.5 million, down to almost half the loss made in the same period of 2012.

Besides selling the Romanian subsidiary, Millennium has to sell its participation in Greek Piraeus bank and cut its staff costs by a quarter by 2015.

Millennium BCP is the largest bank in Portugal based on assets and received a EUR 3 billion recapitalization package last year, as convertible bonds. These were part of the EUR 78 billion loan attracted by Portugal from the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

In Romania, the bank has 65 units. Millennium entered the local market in 2007 and was hoping to make a profit in 2011 but only posted losses on a yearly basis.

editor@romania-insider.com