Coface released its annual ranking of 12 regional countries, this time based on 2017 sales figures. The largest regional company is Polish petrochemicals firm PKN Orlen with sales of EUR 22 billion in 2017, followed by the Czech Republic’s Skoda Auto with EUR 16 billion and Hungarian oil and gas group MOL with EUR 13.3 billion.
Coface said in its survey that the region’s countries were able to benefit from the favorable economic environment as the region’s GDP rose by 4.5 percent in 2017 – the highest growth rate in the past eight years and well above the 3.1 percent growth of 2016. The growth was mainly fueled by export demand (the region’s countries conduct 80 percent of their business within the European Union), domestic consumption but also a recovery in exports to Russia.
The 500 largest companies of Central and Eastern Europe had combined sales of EUR 652 billion last year, a 11 percent growth compared with 2016 and 80 percent of the companies featured in the top 500 were able to increase sales revenues.
Among the Hungarian companies in Coface’s top 500 oil and gas group MOL is the largest, followed by the Hungarian subsidiary of German carmaker Audi AG and national electricity company MVM third. The other companies in the Hungarian top 10 are the Hungarian subsidiary of Germany’s Daimler AG, Suzuki Hungary, followed by the Hungarian subsidiaries of Bosch, Flextronics, Samsung, General Electrics and Tesco Plc.
