Small and medium-sized enterprises will be the engine of recovery in Europe, but improved and easier access to financing is needed, and over the past few years, the European Commission has been continuously working on this, as reiterated in the joint report of the Commission and the European Investment Bank published last week.
The Bank’s support reached as much as 13 billion euros last year, strengthening the position of nearly 220,000 small and medium-sized enterprises across Europe. The report therefore refers to the results of that support as well as to a new generation of financial instruments for SMEs, which will be significantly bolstered with ten billion euros of fresh capital from the EIB.
Guarantee Fund In addition, the Vice-President of the Commission responsible for entrepreneurship and industrial policy, Antonio Tajani, has launched a new online portal about all available EU financial instruments aimed at SMEs, as well as an informational guide to promote stock market listings. With a budget of 1.1 billion euros, the Competitiveness and Innovation Program (CIP) has helped launch over 13 billion euros in loans and 2.3 billion euros in venture capital for SMEs across Europe. For the purpose of the guarantee scheme, the CIP has enabled access to loans for 220,000 SMEs. These guarantees are used in cases where an entrepreneur or small business does not have sufficient collateral for a loan. About 90 percent of users have ten or fewer employees, and this is the category with the most problems in accessing financing. The average loan amounts to about 65,000 euros.
