Raiffeisen Bank Romania’s total investments amounted to EUR 11 million in the first half of the year, more than triple the same period in 2012, according to local business publication Zf.ro.

The lender mainly invested in IT infrastructure and in moving its headquarters from Charles de Gaulle Plaza to Sky Tower office building in Bucharest, where Raiffeisen Bank uses six floors from the 2nd to the 7th.

For this year, the lender approved an investment plan of more than EUR 31 million, three times higher than the one it had last year.

The funds will come from the bank’s own resources.

Raiffeisen Bank Romania ended the first half of the year with a net profit of EUR 60 million, up 20 percent over the same period last year, according to the bank. In H1 2012, the bank’s net profit was EUR 50 million.

The bank’s network comprised 525 units in the first half of the year, down from 539 in the same period last year.

The number of employees also decreased from 5,707 at the end of June 2012, to 5,116 this year.

Vienna-based Raiffeisen Bank International AG (RBI) owns 99.49 percent of Raiffeisen Bank Romania’s shares. The group regards Austria and Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) as its home market.

In CEE, RBI operates an extensive network of subsidiary banks, leasing companies and a range of other specialized financial service providers in 17 markets.

Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com