Kredobank (Lviv) has signed an agreement with the U.S. Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to raise $40 million in guarantees for loans to small and medium-sized businesses in Ukraine.
According to the bank’s statement on Friday, the signing took place in Washington during the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group, the guarantee will cover 80% of the loan amount, meaning that the agreement will allow Kredobank to issue $50 million in business loans.
It is specified that working capital loans, investment loans and leasing under the DFC guarantee will be available to companies operating throughout the government-controlled territory of Ukraine, with no more than 300 employees and no more than $15 million. The maximum loan amount for a client is $1.5 million in equivalent. As part of the program, at least 25% of all loans under DFC’s guarantees must be granted to agricultural enterprises.
Jakub Karnowski, First Deputy Chairman of the Management Board of Kredobank, noted that thanks to the risk-sharing programs that have been operating in the bank for more than two years, he managed to provide Ukrainian entrepreneurs with a total of more than EUR 155 million in loan financing.
Kredobank was founded in 1990. Its sole shareholder is the largest bank in Poland – PKO Bank Polski S.A. According to the National Bank of Ukraine, as of June 1, 2024, Kredobank ranked 14th (UAH 57.93 billion) among 63 banks in the country in terms of assets.
Representatives of the U.S. Corporation for International Development (DFC) have started working in Ukraine on a permanent basis.
“The AmCham Ukraine team held a productive meeting with Caitlin Candee, Project Finance and Political Risk Insurance Specialist, and Anthony Pollak, Investment Advisor, from DFC, who are now represented in Ukraine on a permanent basis,” AmCham Ukraine said in a Facebook post.
According to Pollak’s LinkedIn profile, he has been working in Kyiv on behalf of DFC since July of this year, and a little earlier, in June 2024, he began representing the CrossBoundary group as an investment advisor in Kyiv.
In addition, DFC, the U.S. government’s development finance institution, the successor to OPIC, has launched a special website dedicated to its work in Ukraine. It is noted that before Russia’s full-scale invasion, DFC’s investments in Ukraine amounted to $800 million, but since the beginning of 2022, they have increased by $848 million, or more than doubled. Thus, DFC’s total portfolio as of August 12 was approximately $1.6 billion.
Source: https://interfax.com.ua/
The team of Advantage Ukraine investment platform operating in partnership with the Ministry of Economy of Ukraine prepared and sent the first investment projects, totaling $430 million, to the American Corporation for International Development Finance (DFC) for consideration, the Ministry of Economy said on its website on Wednesday.
“The first five projects have been accepted for consideration by the DFC. In particular, these are projects of Ukrainian investors in the sectors of construction, production, e-commerce and residential real estate – a total of $430 million. Each of them will be evaluated separately. Also the project of crediting a foreign investor for the production of building materials for a few million, “- the department quotes Deputy Minister Oleksandr Griban from a meeting with business, organized by the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine.
He also clarified that at the moment several projects are at the early stages of processing, which Advantage Ukraine hopes to transfer soon to the DFC, in particular, projects in the sectors of logistics, deep agro-processing, energy, livestock and production of building materials.
The Ministry of Economy reminded that DFC has recently announced its readiness to mobilize more than $ 1 billion of private capital to support the Ukrainian economy.
It is noted that the Ministry of Economy and the DFC cooperate in the preparation and formation of the list of investment projects with the help of Advantage Ukraine. The project team of the initiative works with the support of the USAID Competitive Economy Ukraine Program and pre-selects projects, working with applicants.
US-based Development Finance Corporation (DFC, formerly OPIC), an agency of the US federal government, has announced its readiness to lend to Ukrainian businesses within individual projects in amounts ranging from $1 million to $1 billion each, Deputy Economy Minister of Ukraine Oleksandr Hryban said.
“The DFC agency is ready to lend to projects in Ukraine for amounts from $1 million to $1 billion. For the sake of Ukraine, they made an exception and are ready to issue loans even if an American investor is not represented in Ukrainian business,” he said.
At the same time, this information is not yet available on the DFC website. The press release of the corporation says that its head Scott Nathan within the framework of the 77th UN General Assembly last week joined a meeting chaired by President of Poland Andrzej Duda and with the participation of Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal. At the meeting, representatives of Polish and Ukrainian business circles discussed efforts to restore the Ukrainian economy in light of the devastation caused by Russia’s unprovoked war.
According to Hryban, DFC is ready to support Ukraine with several different financial instruments, in particular, to provide coverage for credit risks, including political and war ones.
In addition, the official added that DFC is ready to issue free financial grants to those companies that are recognized as promising, but which have not yet passed an international financial audit.
