VIENNA (Reuters) - Austria's Raiffeisen Zentralbank (RZB), the parent of Raiffeisen International (RIBH.VI: Quote, Profile, Research), said on Friday it has taken a 312 million euro ($494 million) hit from the financial market crisis.

RZB Chief Executive Walter Rothensteiner said this was due to securities and derivative financial instruments in the company's investment portfolio, but said the company should be able to recuperate most of its investment.

"We will be able to turn most of this back into positive figures over the next few years," Rothensteiner told a news conference, adding that probably only 10 percent of the total amount was completely lost.

The company said earlier in a statement that it had applied the mark-to-market method for the 312 million euro valuation.

It said troubling times were still on the horizon.

"From the current vantage point, the difficult market conditions are expected to persist at least until well into the second half of 2008," the statement said.

The bank also said it expected 2008 earnings to rise by a low double digit percentage. RZB had profit before tax of 1.485 billion euros in 2007, up 15.5 percent from the previous year.

(Reporting by Christian Gutlederer, Writing by Sylvia Westall, editing by Will Waterman)