





Romania can't decide on its own to adopt the European currency, bankers say
"A one-sided decision as such is excluded, since we lack the EU consent and it would bear huge risks", said Laurian Lungu, a manager of Macroanalitica. Lungu added that Romania needs time to adjust its imbalance.
His opinion is shared by Ionut Dumitru, chief economist with Raiffeisen Bank, who insisted on the criteria Romania should fulfill in order to adopt the Euro. At this moment, Romania only obeys the low public debt criterion. The budget deficit, the inflation, the long term interest rate and the exchange rate still need adjusting, Dumitru said.
BNR vice governor Cristian Popa believes that "adopting the Euro faster does not mean that we eliminate the convergence process. It doesn't mean that the macroeconomic imbalance disappears, It would still require adjustment".
According to Popa, Romania's targets remain unchanged: joining the ERM 2 mechanism in 2012, so that Romania would join the Euro zone in 2014.