In brief
- In a single day the Government approved five budgets for 2026: IOR, Avioane Craiova, Romarm, the privatisation activity of the Ministry of the Economy and the National Company for Road Infrastructure Administration. Together they come to 23.77 billion lei in revenue, of which CNAIR brings 95.6%.
- CNAIR spends 19.5 billion lei on investment, almost entirely out of allocations from the State budget, and has 1.05 billion lei in overdue receivables, more than the annual transfer for road maintenance.
- Avioane Craiova has 39.2 million lei in unpaid invoices, two and a half times the profit it budgets, and its entire profit of 15.96 million goes to covering losses from previous years.
Published: Official Gazette of Romania (Monitorul Oficial) no. 719 of 28 August 2026
In force from: 28 August 2026
Five state-owned companies found out, 126 days before the end of the year, how much they are allowed to spend in 2026. Government Decisions no. 666, 667, 668, 669 and 670 of 27 August 2026 approve the revenue and expenditure budgets for Societatea IOR, for Societatea „Avioane Craiova”, for Compania Națională Romarm, for the privatisation activity of the Ministry of the Economy, Digitalisation, Entrepreneurship and Tourism and for the National Company for Road Infrastructure Administration. Two of them, Romarm and Avioane Craiova, are exactly the kind of manufacturer towards which the orders should flow from the 16.68 billion euro allocated the following day through the SAFE instrument.
The revenue and expenditure budget of a state-owned company is the document through which the Government sets, for one year, its spending ceilings, its headcount, its average earnings, its investment and what it does with its profit. It is approved by government decision, on the basis of Government Ordinance no. 26/2013 on tightening financial discipline, and the figures in the annex become binding on the company’s management.
The five annexes are printed in facsimile, as tables with 59 rows of indicators. The figures below are read directly from the official edition and checked against the control totals of each table.
What it changes in practice
The first effect is the real size of the package. The five budgets add up to 23.77 billion lei in total revenue, but the split is crushing: CNAIR has 22.73 billion, that is 95.6%, Romarm 680 million, Avioane Craiova 222.8 million, the privatisation activity 61.7 million and IOR 78.4 million. Of the 19.59 billion lei of investment budgeted in total, 19.51 billion, that is 99.6%, belongs to CNAIR.
The second effect concerns the roads. CNAIR budgets investment expenditure of 19,509,285.76 thousand lei, with financing sources of 21,385,171.96 thousand lei, of which 21,044,788 thousand lei are allocations from the State budget, that is 98.4%. Separately, it receives transfers of 1,051,178.20 thousand lei, of which 995,966 thousand lei for maintaining the road infrastructure. The company has 6,805 employees on average, with average monthly earnings of 11,286.31 lei, and closes the year with a budgeted net profit of 159,015.16 thousand lei, of which 143,113.64 thousand go as dividends to the State budget, that is 90%.
On the national road network the Government has meanwhile approved a separate investment objective: 300 sites from which the rovinieță and TollRo are checked, with 1,258 cameras and 132 million lei including VAT.
The third effect is a figure that CNAIR enters under overdue receivables: 1,049,461.24 thousand lei, that is 1.05 billion. It is more than the annual transfer the company receives for maintaining the roads. Under overdue payments, by contrast, the company enters zero.
The fourth effect is the position at Avioane Craiova. The company budgets revenue of 222,757 thousand lei and a net profit of 15,959 thousand, but pays no profit tax, because the whole profit, less legal reserves of 798 thousand, goes to covering accounting losses from previous years: 15,161 thousand lei. The accounting profit left after that operation is zero. At the same time, the company declares overdue payments of 39,203 thousand lei, that is two and a half times the budgeted profit and 19% of its total expenditure.
The fifth effect has to do with the ratio between people and money. Romarm produces 680 million lei of revenue with 79 employees, that is 8,322 thousand lei per person, and pays them best of all five: 16,201 lei gross a month on average. At the other end, IOR has 215 employees on 8,200.39 lei a month and productivity of 353.12 thousand lei per person. Between them, Avioane Craiova pays 12,049 lei to 305 people, and CNAIR 11,286.31 lei to 6,805.
The sixth effect is IOR’s investment programme, out of proportion to the size of the company. Investment expenditure is budgeted at 50,528.83 thousand lei, that is 64% of total revenue of 78,420 thousand, with financing sources of 59,384.91 thousand lei and with the row for budget allocations left empty. The budgeted net profit is 1,510.08 thousand lei, and the decision does not say where the rest of the financing comes from.
The seventh effect is the budget of the privatisation activity, which is built differently from the other four: it has no employees and no profit, only revenue and expenditure, with a zero surplus. Of the 61,717 thousand lei of revenue, 61,628 thousand come from property, that is from dividends and similar amounts, and only 89 thousand lei from privatisation proper. Expenditure comes to 2,692 thousand lei of administration, of which 1,526 thousand for the voluntary dissolution and liquidation of companies and 1,166 thousand for experts in the recruitment of human resources at state-owned companies, plus 59,025 thousand lei of payments into the State treasury.
The eighth effect is an old arrear, entered under the information on the transfer to the State budget: a receivable of 49,202 thousand lei to be recovered, that is 49.2 million, representing financial support granted by the ministry to Romplumb Baia Mare, established by a 2012 judgment. The same place shows 4,904 thousand lei of penalties, late payment increases and interest on dividends.
What has changed compared with the previous situation
The most visible thing is the timing. The budgets concern the year 2026 and were adopted on 27 August 2026, that is, after almost eight months of the financial year they govern had gone by. Until now the companies have operated under the rules on provisional execution, and the approved ceilings apply to a year two thirds consumed.
The delay carried on into September, when the Government approved the budgets of the Constanța and Galați port administrations, on the 264th day of the year.
The legal basis has changed as well, and not for just one of the five. Three decisions, those for IOR, Avioane Craiova and Romarm, rest exclusively on Article 108 of the Constitution and on Article 4(1)(a) of Government Ordinance no. 26/2013. The decision for the privatisation activity does not cite that ordinance at all, but Article 9(1) of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 88/1997 on the privatisation of companies. The decision for CNAIR also cites Article XXXV of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 89/2025 on the Fiscal Code and fiscal and budgetary measures, as well as the State budget law for 2026, Law no. 43/2026, which shows that its budget depends directly on the allocations in the budget law.
A second difference in construction concerns the decision on the privatisation activity, the only one with two articles. Article 2 provides that total expenditure represents maximum limits which may not be exceeded except in justified cases and only with the Government’s approval. The other four decisions have a single article, approving the annex, with no equivalent clause in the body of the act.
Finally, the make-up of the signatories has changed. The four decisions for the companies in the portfolio of the Ministry of the Economy are countersigned by the Deputy Prime Minister who is also Minister of National Defence, which is not usual for the budgets of commercial companies, and the decision for CNAIR is countersigned by an acting Deputy Prime Minister and by a state secretary signing for the Minister of Transport, also acting. The same person, Marius-Andrei Miftode, signs both for the Minister of the Economy in the first four and for the Minister of Transport in the fifth.
Advantages and disadvantages
What it improves
- The figures become public at indicator level: headcount, average earnings, investment, overdue payments and overdue receivables, for each company.
- The control totals add up in all five annexes at the level of revenue, expenditure and gross result, so the tables are arithmetically consistent.
- CNAIR and Romarm pay dividends to the State budget, 143.1 million and 8.3 million lei respectively, so the profit of state-owned companies partly returns to the budget.
- Avioane Craiova covers its losses from previous years in full out of the year’s profit, which cleans up the balance sheet without money from the budget.
- The budget of the privatisation activity shows separately, under information, the old receivables to be recovered and the penalties on dividends.
- Three of the five declare zero overdue payments, and at Romarm the row is filled in explicitly with 0 rather than left blank.
What remains a problem
- The 2026 budgets are approved on 27 August 2026, when 126 days remain of the year they govern.
- Avioane Craiova budgets 39.2 million lei of overdue payments, that is 19% of its total expenditure, without the decision saying how and when they are to be cleared.
- CNAIR has overdue receivables of 1.05 billion lei, more than the annual transfer for road maintenance, with no explanation in the act.
- At CNAIR, 17.96 billion lei, that is 79% of expenditure, sit on a single row called „other operating expenditure”, almost four times larger than all the other operating rows put together.
- IOR budgets investment at 64% of turnover, with the row for budget allocations empty and with a net profit of 1.5 million, without the act indicating the source of the rest of the financing.
- In the privatisation activity, revenue from privatisation proper is 89,000 lei, that is 0.14% of a budget named after that very activity.
Practical advice
- If you supply Avioane Craiova, factor in the 39.2 million lei of overdue payments budgeted for 2026 and ask for payment terms in writing. The figure is assumed by government decision.
- If you work with CNAIR as a contractor, watch the overdue receivables row, 1.05 billion lei. It shows how much the company has to collect, not how much it owes; CNAIR’s overdue payments are budgeted at zero.
- If defence industry orders interest you, compare the three budgets: Romarm spends 566.9 million lei on goods and services, that is four times more than Avioane Craiova, with 129.1 million.
- Trade unions and job candidates can check the staffing ceiling directly: 249 at IOR at the end of the year, 305 at Avioane Craiova, 79 at Romarm, 6,921 at CNAIR. The budgeted average number is lower at IOR and at CNAIR, so both are planning to hire.
- If you follow privatisations, note that the budget for that activity provides for 89,000 lei of privatisation revenue for the whole year, but 1.526 million lei for voluntary dissolutions and liquidations.
- For correct comparisons, read the figures as „thousand lei”, as stated at the head of each annex. A row of 22,730,371.70 means 22.73 billion lei, not 22.7 million.
Frequently asked questions
Why is the 2026 budget approved in August?
What is the largest figure in the whole package?
How much do these companies pay into the State budget?
What do „overdue payments” and „overdue receivables” mean in the tables?
Why does Avioane Craiova pay no profit tax?
Where can I read the full tables?
Errors and inconsistencies in the published text
- Government Decision no. 668/2026, annex, rows 32 to 38. The distribution of Romarm’s profit exceeds the profit available by exactly 832 thousand lei. The accounting profit left after legal reserves, row 32, is 15,790 thousand lei. Out of it, 832 thousand are distributed for the employees’ share in the profit, row 33, and 8,311 thousand as dividends due to the State budget, row 34. Row 38, the undistributed profit that goes to other reserves, ought to be the difference, that is 6,647 thousand lei, but the annex shows 7,479. The three destinations added together come to 16,622 thousand lei, 832 more than the 15,790 available, that is, exactly the value of the employees’ share. The figure of 7,479 is half the amount left after deducting the employees’ share, 14,958, so it looks correctly calculated as a 50% dividend, whereas 8,311 is half of 16,622. Whichever of the two figures is the wrong one, the budget cannot be executed as approved: one amount is allocated twice.
Editorial analysis
Approving five budgets for 2026 in the last week of August is not a late formality but an inversion of what the document is for. A revenue and expenditure budget sets ceilings for a year that is to come; here it ratifies a year almost two thirds consumed. The figures in the annexes are, to a large extent, execution dressed up as authorisation. The practical consequence is that the only thing these decisions can still influence is the 126 days that remain, and at CNAIR that means concentrating an investment programme of 19.5 billion lei into a final quarter.
What does not show when you read the five annexes from cover to cover appears when you set them side by side on the same row. Average monthly earnings range from 8,200.39 lei at IOR to 16,201 lei at Romarm, that is, almost twice as much, in two companies under the same ministry. The difference can be explained by their structure, Romarm being a holding-type company with 79 people administering a group, while IOR has 215 employees in manufacturing. But the same juxtaposition also produces a comparison the acts do not make: Romarm’s 79 people each handle 8,322 thousand lei of revenue, and CNAIR’s 6,805 each handle 3,335.93 thousand lei, on average earnings 30% lower.
The second observation concerns the largest row in the whole package, which is neither wages nor investment. At CNAIR, 17,955,090.66 thousand lei, that is almost 18 billion, sit on the row for „other operating expenditure”. The figure represents 79% of the company’s total expenditure and is almost four times larger than expenditure on goods and services, taxes and staff taken together, which add up to 4,609,346.91 thousand lei. At the other four companies, the same row accounts for between 5.8% and 9% of expenditure. The budget form does not require this row to be broken down, and the decision does not add it, so the largest item of expenditure of the largest company in the package remains, publicly, a single figure with no content.
The third comes from comparing the two indications of financial health that the tables expressly call for. Avioane Craiova declares 39,203 thousand lei of overdue payments and 1,446 thousand of overdue receivables, that is, it owes 27 times more than it has to collect, while budgeting a profit of 15,959 thousand lei that it consumes entirely on old losses. Its financial expenditure, 13,495 thousand lei, against financial revenue of 4,022 thousand, means a net cost of financing of 9,473 thousand, that is 59% of the gross profit. At the opposite pole, CNAIR has zero overdue payments and 1.05 billion lei of overdue receivables, that is, exactly the reverse profile: it owes nothing but does not collect. The two situations call for different measures, and none of the five decisions contains any provision beyond approving the annex.
The fourth concerns what happens to the profit. Of the four companies with a profit, two send part of it to the State budget, CNAIR 90% and Romarm around half, Avioane Craiova uses it entirely on old losses, and IOR moves it entirely to other reserves, as its own source of financing, paying nothing over. All four destinations are possible in law, but the decisions do not say why each was chosen, although the choice has direct effects on the State budget.
What should be changed
- Correcting the distribution of Romarm’s profit. The 832 thousand lei allocated twice make the budget unexecutable as it stands; putting it right calls either for recalculating the dividend at 7,479 thousand or the undistributed amount at 6,647 thousand.
- A statutory deadline for approving the budgets of state-owned companies. An annual budget approved 126 days before the end of the year can no longer order anything; a sanctioned deadline, the end of the first quarter for example, would restore the function of the document.
- A compulsory breakdown of the „other operating expenditure” row above a certain threshold. At CNAIR that row alone means 79% of expenditure and 18 billion lei, and the public cannot tell from the act what it contains.
- An explanatory note on overdue payments and receivables above a threshold. 39.2 million lei of debts due at Avioane Craiova and 1.05 billion of receivables at CNAIR are figures the decision approves without attaching any plan to them.
- Reasons for the destination of the profit. Where a profitable state-owned company pays nothing over to the budget, the decision ought to say why, all the more so when others in the same package pay over 90%.
- Publication of the state of the receivable from Romplumb Baia Mare. An amount of 49.2 million lei established by a 2012 judgment reappears in the 2026 budget under the same heading of amounts to be recovered, with no information about what has been attempted in the meantime.
Original text of the legal act
The text below is reproduced in Romanian, the official form of publication.
The full text, as published in the Official Gazette of Romania
Official Gazette of Romania no. 719 of 28 August 2026 16 pages PDF, 208 KB the act starts on page 3
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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For specific situations, consult a licensed attorney or tax advisor.