The result of Sunday's presidential runoff is quite novel: both contenders - Mircea Geoana and Traian Basescu - claim victory. According to an INSOMAR exit poll, Geoana won the election by 51.6 percent of the votes, while Basescu got 48.4 percent. The Social Democratic leader celebrated his win in a classic victor's speech after the results of the exit polls were released late on Sunday, alongside his ally Liberal head Crin Antonescu. While Geoana was exulting that he will go to the Cotroceni presidential Palace, incumbent Basescu was speaking at the Democratic Liberal Party (PD-L) headquarters of other exit polls, which he alleged to be 'correct' and which placed him the winner of the race, Evenimentul zilei reports.

The exit polls released at 9 p.m. on Sunday by pollsters CURS, CCSB and INSOMAR showed Geoana to be the winner of the runoff, Jurnalul National reports. Geoana said after the exit polls showed he was the winner of the presidential race that it is a beautiful night for democracy, that it is a hard-won victory and it is equally Crin Antonescu's victory, with Geoana thanking the Liberals.

Basescu said he assures the Romanians that he won the election, pointing out that the real exit polls at 7 p.m. on Sunday showed he had a lead on Geoana. 'I assure you that this time too, as in 2004, you can have full confidence in what I am telling you: I have won!', Basescu said. The print media comments the results of the exit polls in such headlines as 'Neck and neck. Highest post-2000 turnout' (Business Standard), 'One Romania, two presidents: Geoana and Basescu claim victory' (Cotidianul), 'Exit-poll president' (Adevarul), 'Dangerous 50-50 result calls for clear victory' (Bursa).

Sibiu mayor Klaus Johannis, whom Geoana said would name as a prime minister if he becomes president, said he, Geoana and Antonescu had agreed to meet on Monday in order to establish the next steps to be made so that he be named premier. Johannis told a news conference in the central Sibiu city late on Sunday that the results of the presidential election had been 'predictable' and that 'alternate holding power has become the rule', which 'is very good for democracy', Jurnalul National reports.

What did the politicians vote for, asks Jurnalul National. A vote for change or for continuity, a lucky vote, a vote for normalcy, a vote for a team or an explicit vote for Mircea Geoana - these are the options voiced by the main political leaders after casting their vote, says the daily, that carries their statements after leaving the polling stations.

The next government will have to borrow at least one or two billion euros from the bankers, even though it gets the loan tranches from the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission, in order to cover a financing demand of some five to six billion euros, to cover the budget deficit in the first quarter of 2010 and to pay the debts to the banks and private firms. The new government, no matter what its political colour, needs additional funds for the first three months of next year at around five to six billion euros, Finance Minister state secretary Gheorghe Gherghina says. 'Theoretically speaking, the new government will have to resume the relations with the IMF, to put forward the 2010 budget to Parliament and to get both tranches of the money from the IMF, the European Commission and the World Bank as quickly as possible,' Cotidianul writes.

The Finance Ministry has so far succeeded to keep the budget deficit under control, with the fiscal imbalance rising nearly one percentage point in November to about 6 percent of GDP (30 billion lei), Ziarul financiar quotes Finance Minister Gheorghe Pogea as saying. There is the danger, though, that the state has not honoured the spending to the private sector, as some companies accused in the last months.

Given these circumstances, it seems possible for the Romanian economy to meet the budget deficit target of 7.3 percent of GDP that Bucharest negotiated with the IMF for this year, in spite of the pessimistic estimates in the last months by the analysts and financial institutions, who anticipated a figure closer to 8 percent of GDP.

'Three budget deficit scenarios: layoffs, hiked taxes or economic disaster', the Business Standard writes, as it cautions that the budget expenditure has got out of control in the last 12 months and this has become the main problem that the next government must manage in 2010, when the budget gap should be narrowed by at least 2.5 billion euros, according to the financing understanding forged with the IMF.

With just three weeks to go till the end of the year, the financial-banking institutions show signs that they want to make the loans more accessible. The long-awaited cuts of the loan interest rates have begun to emerge in the Romanian banking market. According to Capital weekly, most financial institutions have cut the interests, with the most significant such cuts being to the leu loans. Interest have dropped by up to 6.7 percent from July.

The European Commission has authorised a state aid scheme proposed by Romania, by which the companies facing financing difficulties can get up to 500,000 euros in aid by the end of next year, the Commission announced on Friday. The state aid can be granted in non-repayable amounts, loans under preferential conditions, interest-rate subsidies, guarantees or the restructuring of the state claims without charging an interest, Curierul National explains.

AGERPRES