Austria's top economic news - April 15

Austrian regional bank Oberbank plans to boost its network in Bavaria to 30 branches from 20 currently. The company started its expansion in Germany 20 years ago. Currently it employs 180 in Bavaria.
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Bank Austria boosted its GDP forecast for Austria to 2.8% for 2011 from 2.3% projected before. However, the analysts reduced their projection for 2012 to 1.8% from 2%. The economy rose 0.9% in the first quarter of 2011.
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Shareholders of Lufthansa want to launch an examination of the buy of Austrian Airlines (AUA) and the latter's corporate value, Format wrote. The necessary application for the review will be filed at the Lufthansa's shareholders meeting on May 3.
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BDI - BioEnergy International said today its founders CEO Wilhelm Hammer and CTO Helmut Gössler will leave the company as of June 30, 2011 due to personal reasons. The managers will remain shareholders in the company. Markus Dielacher and Edgar Ahn will join the management as of the start of July.
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The construction cost index in Austria grew 3.3% year-on-year to 102.1 points in March 2011, Statistik Austria said. The index remained stable compared to February.
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Austria's annual inflation rate grew to 3.1% in March from 3.0% in February. The EU harmonised index stood at 3.3%. These are the highest rates since the autumn of 2008 and were attributed to growth in mineral oil and food products, Statistik Austria said.
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OMV's electricity trading subsidiary OMV Trading GmbH has closed its first deal, OMV said. No further details were given.
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Österreichische Volksbanken AG (ÖVAG) will get a capital injection of EUR 300m from its core shareholders, the 62 Austrian cooperative banks. The proceeds will be used for offsetting EUR 300m from the bank's state aid of a total of EUR 1bn. Furthermore, OeVAG plans to transfer its banking activities to its subsidiary Investkredit Bank via de-merger and to operate under the name of Österreichische Volksbanken-AG in the future.