GB00_erste lage_E - Erste Group

However, lower income from trading through ÖTOB was offset by expanding the range of services
offered to Austrian investors on international derivatives markets. In trading with East European
stocks, Erste Bank consolidated or even expanded its market share despite an overall decline
in this segment (Hungary: leading position both in 1999 and in 2000; Czech Republic: third
place in 1999 and second place in 2000; Poland: ranked seventh in 1999, sixth in 2000).
Investment Banking in Central and Eastern Europe
Erste Bank operates investment bank units in every country of its extended home market (Hungary,
Czech Republic, Croatia) as well as in Poland.
The principal fields of activity include corporate advisory, mergers and acquisitions, new issue
origination, securities brokerage, stock trading, research and asset management. Despite difficult
macroeconomic and political conditions and a negative international environment that triggered
a slump on stock markets in the second half of the year, almost all units managed to improve
their earnings position in 2000, some of them even by a significant margin.
CDI Erste Central Europe Holding GmbH (part of CDI, Corporate Development International)
is responsible for the Erste Bank Group’s Central European M&A activities for the subsidiaries
and offices in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Croatia. In 1999 and 2000, the Erste
Bank Group strengthened its collaboration with CDI and raised its direct ownership in the holding
to 70.1%.
Treasury
The Erste Bank Treasury once again operated in a highly volatile market environment in 2000.
After an increase in short-term rates, the interest rate curve increasingly flattened out as the
year progressed. At the same time, the euro went on a downslide, which could not even be brought
to a halt by repeated central bank interventions. The trend only turned around after news of significantly
weaker US economic data had become a reality and the central bank had resorted to
further support buying.
The acquisitions of the past two years created the basis for consolidating the Group’s Treasury
activities into a single unit designed to pool the potentials of the Group’s domestic and foreign
subsidiaries. This measure has set the stage for the newly acquired subsidiaries in Slovakia and
Croatia to benefit from the resulting synergy effects especially with a view to funding and liquidity
& risk management.
The integration of the treasury activities of Česká spořitelna, a.s. into the Group Treasury
marked a further step towards completing the structures required to fully meet customers’ needs
as defined in Erste Bank’s strategy for Central Europe.
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