Bulgarian Development Bank (BDB) will develop a new products to support the process of utilization of EU funds in the country. This was announced by the Executive Director of the Bank, Iliya Karanikolov, during the conference “EU funds and competitiveness”. According to him, this is necessary also with relation to the increasing role of BDB to facilitate the access to financing for the business.
The guarantees currently issued by the National Guarantee Fund (NGF), subsidiary of the bank, can be cover for loans extended under EU financed projects. The Fund covers 50% of the credit risk of the small and medium sized companies and works with 11 banks in the country.
Mr. Karanikolov announced that due to the guarantees issued by NGF, a reduction of up to 1,5% of the interest was achieved on investment loans for up to 1 million euros. One of the main advantages of the guarantees issued by NFG is that they can be used as “bridge collateral” of the investments as well as the opportunity it offers to small start -up companies to obtain credits. Since its establishment NGF has issued guarantees to projects in the amount of 291 million euros.
Participants in the conference, sponsored by BDB, were Tomislav Donchev, Minister of EU funds Absorption, Evgeni Angelov, Deputy Minister of Economy, Energy and Tourism, Ms. Pencheva, Deputy Minister of Finance and representatives of the banking sector, business and consulting organizations.
