DBT and European Investment Fund sign €80 million guarantee agreement to increase lending to SMEs in Sweden - Hoofdinhoud

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  DBT first private lender in Sweden to receive EIF support under InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility.
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  Deal will make available up to €80 million in new lending to SMEs and mid-caps.
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  Project supported by EU budget under the Investment Plan for Europe, or Juncker Plan.

DBT Företagslån (“DBT”) becomes the first Swedish private lender to enter into agreement with the European Investment Fund (EIF) under the “InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility”. The guarantee agreement will facilitate DBT’s new lending of up to €80 million. To date, only Swedish state-financed lenders such as Exportkreditnämnden (EKN), Svensk Exportkredit (SEK), ALMI och Stiftelsen Norrlandsfonden had received support under the European Commission’s “InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility”, which is backed by the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), heart of the Investment Plan for Europe, or Juncker Plan.

European Commission Vice-President Jyrki Katainen i, responsible for Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness, said: "Thanks to this financing agreement with DBT, Swedish companies wishing to scale their business or expand their production capacity have another source to apply to for financial support. Thanks to the Investment Plan’s backing of the European Investment Fund, already more than 10,000 SMEs in Sweden can benefit from loans at favourable terms."

EIF Chief Executive, Pier Luigi Gilibert, added: “Signing the first private lender in Sweden is a great milestone for us, and proof of the necessity of offering this type of guarantee scheme. Access to finance is a chronic issue ever since the financial crisis and the EIF remains fully committed to address the issue with all the means it has.”

Alexis Kopylov, CEO of DBT, said: “We are incredibly proud that the EIF after thorough due diligence and a comprehensive approval process has approved DBT for its InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility. For DBT, this is a great testament of our lending operations and the dedicated and robust way in which we have built DBT since start. The guarantee facility is an important milestone in DBT's ambition to build the leading lender to small and medium-sized companies. For our customers, this means that we now can offer a more favourable interest rate as a result of the EIF InnovFin guarantee.”

Under the agreement, DBT will take into account the InnovFin guarantee in its price calculation for new loans, thus offering more favourable terms to SMEs and small mid-caps. The guarantee also translates into a risk spread reduction for the final recipient.

Background information

The European Investment Fund (EIF) is part of the European Investment Bank group. Its central mission is to support Europe's micro, small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) by helping them to access finance. EIF designs and develops venture and growth capital, guarantees and microfinance instruments which specifically target this market segment. In this role, EIF fosters EU objectives in support of innovation, research and development, entrepreneurship, growth, and employment.

DBT Företagslån (DBT) is a specialist lender focusing on Sweden’s growing SMEs. Enabling growth by offering transparent and flexible growth-oriented loans as an alternative to the rigid high street banks and undue short-term loans. www.dbtforetagslan.se

The InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility - managed by the EIF - is an initiative launched by the European Commission and the EIB Group in order to improve European small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) access to finance. The InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility is deployed by eligible local banks, leasing companies, guarantee institutions (“financial intermediaries”), etc. which are selected after a due diligence process. The EIF, acting as the implementing body, covers a portion of the losses incurred by the financial intermediaries on loans, leases and guarantees between €25 000 and €7.5 million, which they provide under the InnovFin SME Guarantee Facility. By collaborating with carefully selected financial intermediaries the EU and the EIF can, in this way, allow the provision of more debt financing to innovative SMEs and innovative small and medium-sized companies across Europe. Selected European banks that have previously been approved include Ålandsbanken, HSBC, Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Barclays Bank and Nordea.

The Investment Plan for Europe - the Juncker Plan - focuses on strengthening European investments to create jobs and growth. It does so by making smarter use of new and existing financial resources, removing obstacles to investment, and providing visibility and technical assistance to investment projects. The European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) is the central pillar of the Juncker Plan. It provides a first loss guarantee, allowing the EIB to invest in more, often riskier, projects. As of May, the projects and agreements approved for financing under the EFSI are already expected to mobilise €398.6 billion in investments and support around 949,000 SMEs across all 28 Member States. Find the latest EFSI figures by sector and by country here, or see the FAQs.