REPORT & VIDEO LAUNCH EVENT Political Party Financing in 2025 and the Urgent Need for Reform

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Income and expenses

A total of 68 parties out of 270 published the mandatory data in the Official Gazette, which remains relatively constant compared to previous years. A small number of parties published the information after the legal deadline of April 30 – the submission deadline had not expired at the time of the analysis.

In the last 7 years, political parties and national minority organizations have had income and expenses of almost 5 billion lei (1 eur = approx. 5 eur)

According to the collected data, in 2025, 92 political parties and national minority organizations for which tax returns were published by May 14 had total revenues of approximately 705 million lei. Of this amount, political parties declared revenues of approximately 323 million lei, with the remainder attributable to national minority organizations. The amounts are lower than in 2024 (total revenues of 1.5 billion lei), but comparable to previous election years, such as 2020.

  

The total expenditures was 731 million lei, of which 402 million lei were reported by political parties. In 2025, the declared revenues of the largest parties decreased significantly compared to the peak in 2024: AUR reached approximately 90.8 million lei, PSD 79 million, PNL 69 million, and USR 65.7 million. Even so, the level of funding remains consistent, and the dependence of parties on public funds and loans raises important issues of equitable access to resources, transparency, and effective control.

• Private income, from donations, contributions and loans, represents less than a third of total party funding.
• Membership fees amounted to 40.6 million lei, but only a very small part of them came from large contributors. If we analyze, for example, the data related to contributions, we can see that only 2 and 20% of the funds, depending on the year, represent contributions worth over 10 SMB – in practice, we cannot find out much about the rest of the contributors, especially if the RVCs are not published in full. We believe that publication should not start even from the smallest contributions, but transparency of financing must be ensured when the amounts exceed certain values.

• Much more important are the loans, which reached 112 million lei. PSD recorded the highest value of loans, 83 million lei, followed by AUR, with 25.8 million, PUSL with 1.9 million lei, USR with 970 thousand lei. PNL took only 30,000 lei in loans (PNL Botoșani). These data confirm that loans have become the main instrument of private financing, both for current activity and for campaigns. This dependence on loans creates risks. The loan can formally function as temporary financing, but it can also become a mechanism through which political influence is built. The current repayment term, up to three years, is too long, especially in an electoral context. In addition, the law allows the transformation of loans into donations, within certain limits, which can further weaken control over the origin and destination of money. The report recommends shortening repayment terms, clearly delimiting campaign loans, prohibiting their conversion into donations, and reducing maximum limits for donations and loans, for both individuals and legal entities. It also recommends introducing an overall annual limit per donor, rather than separate limits per party and type of contribution.

• Donations were significantly lower: the most significant, collected from individuals above the threshold of 10 gross minimum wages, amounted to 6.6 million lei, and those from legal entities approximately 692,000 lei. For individuals, most of the money comes from PNL – 3 million lei, USR – 1.3 million lei and PSD – 900 thousand lei. For legal entities, PNL declared funds – 419,600 lei, PUSL – 200,000 lei, USR – 55,892 lei and UDMR 17,000 lei.

 

• The annual financial limits for funds paid to a party remain very high: the equivalent of 200 gross minimum wages (GWW) for donations and loans from individuals, 500 GWW for donations and loans from legal entities, 48 ​​GWW for contributions. In 2025, the GWW was 4,050 lei, so the limits are: 810,000 lei, 2,025,000 lei and 194,400 lei. The same limits are maintained for each electoral campaign, regardless of their number in a year – except for contributions, which are registered only with parties. Law 334/2006 provides limits per party and per type of financial contribution (donations/loans), but does not impose an overall limit per person.  

Subsidies for political parties

In 2025, eight parties received subsidies worth 232 million lei, as follows: PSD – 76.9 million lei, AUR – 45.5 million lei, PNL 41.9 million lei, USR 29.8 million lei, SOS Romania 19.8 million lei, POT 15.9 million lei, PMP and Forța Dreptei one million lei each.

In 2025, the parties spent 244 million lei . Most of the money spent came from PSD – 97 million lei, AUR – 39.9 million and PNL 41 million lei. USR spent 37.4 million lei. SOS Romania spent 16.8 million lei, and POT 8.5 million lei.

The largest part of the funds was spent on press and propaganda (117 million lei, 48%), personnel (27 million lei, 11%), and investments in movable and immovable property (almost 22 million lei, 9%).  13 million lei were spent on organizing political activities, and 11 million lei on political consultancy.

PSD, USR (126% each) and PMP (135%) spent more in 2025 than they received. We remind you that parties can save money from one year to the next, as they are not obliged to return funds, as public institutions in Romania usually do. POT spent 54% of the money received, PNL 98%, AUR 88%, and SOS Romania 85%.

We identified income declared in advance (money received by parties but not registered in the accountancy as income in 2025)  of 57 million lei from parliamentary parties that receive subsidies, which most likely represent savings from such funds.

If we look at the ratio of subsidy revenues versus total annual revenues declared to the fiscal authorities, the situation is relatively diverse and can vary from 50% to 80% in the last 2 years. In non-election years, the percentage of subsidies in the total is higher.

 Subsidies remain too high, the mechanism for establishing the annual budget is insufficiently justified, and unspent funds can be kept by parties, which allows the accumulation of resources and can create imbalances between competitors.

Election reimbursements

For the elections in the last 2 years, the AEP reimbursed 888 million lei – 232.8 for parliamentary, 104 million lei for European parliamentary, 219 million lei for local, 210 million lei for the 2025 presidential and 123 million lei for the 2024 presidential elections. The significant reimbursements and the Romanian state’s policy of covering almost all party expenses from public money are harmful and encourage an unhealthy dependence on the state. 

The legislation is unclear regarding the types of funds that are reimbursed, which may lead to a situation where even donations are reimbursed. According to the Civil Code, a donation is a contract by which the donor transmits, with the intention of gratifying and without consideration, an asset or a right in the donee’s patrimony. Its essential character is gratuitousness, and the legal effect consists in the diminution of the donor’s patrimony and the corresponding increase of the donee’s patrimony. In other words, the donation should not be refundable.

National minority organizations

A total of 20 national minority organizations were allocated from state budget (different mechanism than for the subsidies) 296 million lei of public money at the beginning of 2025, and in 2026 they received 266 million lei . According to data declared to fiscal authorities in 2025, we identified revenues of 381 million lei recorded by these organizations, totals that also include other sources of funding.

UDMR does not receive money from subsidies (although it was entitled to), as it opted to receive funds for the activity of national minority organizations. It should be noted, however, that the sources of funding of these organizations may be different from those of political parties and involve, among other things, allocations from the General Secretariat of the Government for specific operations and activities.

 

Profile of funders of political parties

• Overall, financing through loans seems much more important than financing through donations or contributions, especially for PSD and AUR .
• We have identified, as in previous years, possible cases of financiers for whom donations or loans do not necessarily correlate with the data in the asset declarations or the financial information reported to the Ministry of Finance. The report explicitly marks several such cases with question marks, especially for large loans granted by individuals or companies with limited economic activity, losses, high debts or very recent establishment.
• Parties used private funding for their campaigns to a much greater extent than subsidies, similar to 2024. The goal seems to be to obtain reimbursements from public money, in parallel with using subsidies for party activity.
• Unlike in 2024, we did not identify cases where the same donor transferred money to two or more parties. However, it is important to note the existence of donors who changed their beneficiary party. The most frequent situations are those in which people who donated to the PSD contributed in 2025 to AUR. We also observed cases in which members of the PNL granted loans to the PSD. This observation is relevant, as it indicates that there is not always a clear political allegiance, and in some cases financial interest seems to prevail.
• For a few individuals, we could not find any public information about the funders . Most of them were also on the 2024 list.

Analysis of the profile of funders shows major differences between parties.

• PSD is characterized by consistent funding from individuals and companies connected to the economic environment, administration, public contracts, or sectors dependent on public decisions, such as construction, real estate, energy, health, services, or sanitation.
• AUR is notable for a high share of loans from individuals, including elected officials, candidates, entrepreneurs or people close to the party, but also for cases where publicly visible financial capacity does not seem to fully explain the amounts granted. Some of AUR’s 2025 donors have donated to PSD in the past.
• PNL has a more institutionalized profile, linked to candidates, local elected officials, parliamentarians or leaders of organizations, and a significant part of the reported amounts seems to come from campaign contributions. PSD received money from several local elected officials/former PNL donors.
• USR has a lower volume of large funding, coming mainly from professionals and entrepreneurs in the technology or education areas.
• PUSL appears to be supported by a small circle of financiers connected to Dan Voiculescu, his family, or companies in his portfolio. UDMR has limited private income, with most of its funds coming from public money.

Reporting and transparency

A major problem is the insufficient transparency of the reports, doubled by documents published in different formats, which do not allow for a solid comparison based on the same indicators. The reports published in the Official Gazette and on the PEA website are not uniform, detailed or easy to analyze. Income and expenditure reports are published in different formats, and some parties only offer very synthetic versions. The confusing format and different structure of the reports limit the possibility of solid comparative analyses.

The structure of the reports does not facilitate the breakdown of income and expenses for the party versus the electoral context.

The current thresholds for the publication of donor names are high, which limits public access to relevant information. The names of donors or contributors are published from the equivalent of 10 minimum salaries (almost 8,000 euros), and loans from 100 salaries, which means over 80,000 euros.

During the campaign, competitors declare their income and expenses without details about the original source of their funding. The PEA does not have access to this information during the campaign and receives data only with the final report (submitted 15 days after the election date). The public version of the final report does not include data about the competitor’s funders, which means that we do not actually find out who financed the party or candidate.

The PEA has no legal obligation to publish income and expenses reports during the campaign, which may allow for delays or arbitrary decisions. In practice, this data is published weekly, but depends on the decision of the PEA leadership. 

The report recommends an efficient electronic data collection and publication system, detailed monthly reporting on subsidies, publication of final recipients of funds, and inclusion of the identity of funders in final campaign reports.

Recommendations

Income 

• The maximum limits for donations and loans to individuals and legal entities should be reduced. Donations and loans could be reduced to a maximum of 75 SMB for individuals and 150 SMB for legal entities.
• To limit undue political influence, the law should impose maximum annual limits on donations and loans for an individual and/or legal entity.  A possible solution would be to impose a maximum limit of 1.5-2 times for election years the usual limits for financing the current activity of parties.
• The law should require donors and contributors to make payments worth over one SMB exclusively through a bank account.
• The repayment period for loans should be shortened, and for campaign loans, it should be as close as possible to the deadline for post-election reporting. The law should provide that campaign loans must be clearly demarcated from campaign funds.   
• The law must be clarified to establish that repayment is made within a period that relates to the date the loan was obtained.
• The law must prohibit the conversion of loans into donations.
• The law should prohibit political party or election campaign financing with cryptocurrencies.
• The law should extend this restriction to party financing, especially in the context where party funds are subsequently transferred to electoral campaigns.

Third parties 

• To increase transparency and reduce illegal parallel campaigns, the law should regulate under what conditions third parties can contribute to a competitor’s campaign and how they can declare these contributions.
• The activity of political foundations should be regulated, to clarify whether they can contribute to the conduct of electoral campaigns.

Subsidies 

• The mechanism for setting the annual budget should be modified to include predictable criteria for its preparation. The law could either set a lower upper threshold – for example, 0.2% of the national budget – or an annually indexed cost per vote, doubled by an annual maximum limit. A feature of German law could also be adopted, namely that after a certain number of votes the amount received per vote is reduced, in order to favor small parties, which obtain fewer votes compared to large parties.
•  The process by which the annual budget is prepared and approved must include a much clearer substantiation of the needs of political parties.
• The percentage of allocation for parties that achieve results in local elections should be increased to 40%. The law should reduce the limit for obtaining subsidies for results in local elections to a more reasonable number of local elected officials and also take into account the results from elections for mayors or local councilors.
• Parties should return the money they don’t spend at the end of the year .
• The legislation should clarify and explain the types of expenses allowed, within each broad category described by Law 334/2006. For example, it could be clarified what is meant by propaganda expenses or what is meant by protocol expenses.
• The law should impose certain percentage limits on subsidy spending, especially when it comes to the press and propaganda budget line. Parties should not be able to use more than 30% of subsidies for contracts for press and propaganda. The law should impose a percentage limit (e.g., 30%) on public funds used for campaign financing.
• Legislation should provide that a party cannot award contracts from public funds to suppliers owned by persons close to the party’s decision-makers – for example, relatives or in-laws up to the 3rd or 4th degree.  
• Monthly reporting on subsidies should be mandatory and more detailed. Revenues and expenditures from subsidies should be clearly marked in the income and expenditure report. The legislation should provide for additional mechanisms for controlling subsidies by the PEA.
• The law must require detailed, regular reporting , at least monthly, on the final beneficiaries of the funds.
• The law must establish a procedure for recalculating subsidies if a party undergoes significant changes in its parliamentary representation and therefore no longer reflects the number of votes obtained in the last elections.

 

Reimbursements 

• The general policy on reimbursements should be reconsidered, so that political parties are not financed almost entirely from the public budget and to support parties with less financial capacity. The legislation should clearly stipulate which types of funds can be reimbursed, so as to take into account the general regulations on donations. Donations should also not be subject to reimbursement.

Data and reporting  

The IT system for collecting data on political financing should be completed to allow for the collection and publication of data in an efficient and structured manner. It should also integrate data on the registration and operation of political parties.

>> party financing

• To ensure transparency of funding, income and expenditure reports should be published in a more detailed and uniform form.
• To ensure a balance between personal data protection and transparency of the process, the names of donors over 1 SMB could be published.
• Legislation should clearly specify what information is published regarding donors above certain thresholds, as well as what types of income are reported under each reporting category, to ensure uniform reporting.
• The identity of people who finance a party with a value of over 30 SMB should be made public throughout the year, by publishing on the AEP website.
• The RVC format should more clearly highlight the expenses for party financing, respectively those for financing the electoral campaign.

>> campaign financing

• The law should require the mandatory publication of electoral competitors’ income and expenditure reports by the AEP on a regular basis, during the campaign. Electoral competitors should declare information related to the source of funds (not just the type of income) as part of interim reports.
• The public form of final campaign finance reports must include the identity of the campaign funders.

Data and reporting  

• The limits for spending, especially in presidential and European parliamentary elections, should be reduced. For the presidential elections, we propose 10,000 SMB, and for the European parliamentary elections, 450 SMB.

Oversight

• Control for non-parliamentary parties, which do not receive subsidies and which have no activity or budget, could be carried out every 2 years.
• Verification of funds transferred to political parties or campaigns should be strengthened, including through inter-institutional collaboration.
• The powers of the PEA to initiate such investigations should be expanded.
• The financial and human resources capacity of the PEA, as well as the mechanisms to ensure institutional independence, should be strengthened.

Declarations of assets and interests

• Parliament should regulate the procedure for publishing declarations of assets and interests.