* Bourse down 24 pct this year, hit lowest since mid-2009
* New govt reshuffles state-run companies' management
* Future of Polish economy uncertain, fund managers say
By Adrian Krajewski and Marcin Goclowski
WARSAW, Dec 14 (Reuters) - Poland's ruling conservatives have ousted several top executives of state-owned companies since taking power after an October election, in what investors worry marks the start of a campaign to seize more control over the economy.
In a sign of mounting concern among fund managers, Warsaw's blue-chip WIG20 share index hit its lowest level in six years last week, extending losses that followed the shock election of President Andrzej Duda in May.
That paved the way for his economically left-leaning but nationalist-minded Law and Justice party (PiS) to score a landmark election win in October.
Investors are concerned primarily about PiS plans to tax banks and large retailers to fund social spending, and about signals that PiS wants to rearrange the energy sector to have successful firms assume the financial problems of loss-making coal miners.
PiS has built its popularity on a promise of more economic equality and has said it wants Polish, not foreign, money to have more control over business.
"When I hear how good (PiS tells us) Poland is going to be and at the same time I witness how the economy is getting battered, I truly give up. It may be high time to flee the country," said a Warsaw-based economist at a foreign-owned bank, declining to be quoted by name.
Reuters spoke with 10 fund managers, economists and bankers, who have expressed similar concerns.
Polish banks, the most likely targets of PiS policy plans, have shed 28 percent of their value this year, while energy companies, which together with banks make up around half of the WIG20, have lost 35 percent.
In the latest sacking, the supervisory board of Poland's dominant gas firm PGNiG dismissed the state-run company's head Mariusz Zawisza on Friday, replacing him with former PiS economy minister Piotr Wozniak as acting CEO.
State-run utilities Enea and Energa also sacked executives last week.
The head of the state-controlled Warsaw bourse has also resigned, as have the head of cargo carrier PKP Cargo and the chief executive of insurer PZU, raising doubts about PZU's ambitions to build a top five Polish bank.
Polish governments tend to reshuffle top management at state-owned companies, but PiS has acted less than a month after taking office.
The country's biggest lender PKO, Europe's No.2 copper producer KGHM and top refiner PKN are seen next in line for management reshuffles.
"Changes are something that is expected and natural (when government changes). This market anxiety is unfounded," Poland's deputy treasury minister Marek Zagorski told Reuters. "The treasury ministry's role is to calm the situation and enable the Warsaw bourse's development."
ROCKING THE BOAT
There have been few concrete signs the dismissals have affected company policies, but investors are concerned the new bosses will push the government's agenda.
"I am afraid they will rock the boat, which will lead to lower foreign and domestic investments, while banks will curb lending because of the new tax. In one year's time we will see an economic slowdown," a bank source said.
Bankers, fund managers and economists fret about a repeat of Hungary's situation, where unpredictable economic policies by Prime Minister Victor Orban's government, a role model for PiS leaders, are blamed for scaring off investors.
Hungary's central bank bought a majority stake in the country's sluggish stock exchange last month, after Europe's highest bank levies cut the Budapest bourse's turnover by 70 percent between 2010 and 2014.
"Several factors have appeared simultaneously (in Poland)," a Warsaw-based fund manager said. "Some face management changes, others factor in tax hikes."
"Positives are hard to find," the fund manager said. "We can evaluate the effect of the bank asset levy on the lenders' balance sheets, but the wider influence on the future of Poland's economy is unpredictable."
Investors worry the government could try to take over some assets of Polish pension funds if it struggles to finance budget spending, effectively eliminating them as relevant market players.
Poland, Eastern Europe's biggest economy, has not suffered a recession in 20 years. This and around $11-billion worth of privatisations implemented since the 1989 fall of communism have made its bourse central Europe's largest.
However, the valuation of recently privatised companies are likely to come under scrutiny after the Supreme Audit Office said last week that the state treasury had sold several companies too cheap, including chemical group Ciech.
Retailers also face a new levy next year while the new bank tax bill, already in parliament, could cost the financial sector up to 7 billion zlotys ($1.8 bln) next year.
The plan mirrors taxes imposed on Hungarian banks in 2010 by Prime Minister Orban. Last month, Hungary proposed capping the tax by more than half the current level, fearing that weak corporate lending may jeopardise economic recovery.
Poland's central bank governor Marek Belka warned on Friday that the simultaneous introduction of the bank tax and the government's plan to force banks to shoulder much of the burden of converting Swiss franc-denominated mortgages would cause a "serious crisis" for some banks.
Market sources said uncertainty regarding the banking sector has delayed ongoing sales of local units by Raiffeisen and General Electric .
Foreign banks have been retreating from Poland in the past few years due to falling margins, a trend highlighted by Deutsche Bank's Polish arm last week when it raised mortgage loan rates.
"The decision ... was caused by the bank's strategy ... as well as the necessity to adjust to the challenges facing Deutsche Bank and the whole sector," Leszek Niemycki, Deutsche Bank Polska's deputy chief, said. ($1 = 3.9693 zlotys)
