Romanian CEC Bank to finance SMEs with EUR 25 mln loan from the Council of Europe Development Bank

Romanian lender CEC Bank has recently signed a loan agreement worth EUR 25 million with the Council of Europe Development Bank (CEB), money which will be used for funding investment projects of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and public sector entities. The maximum lending period for SMEs will be six years, with a grace period of one year, while in the case of public entities, the lending period will be of maximum 10 years and a two-year grace period. CEB funding will represent maximum 50 percent of the total project cost. The value of CEB’s financing will be up to EUR 1 million for SMEs and maximum EUR 2.5 million for public entities. CEC Bank had a gross profit of some EUR 7.6 million (RON 33.5 million) in 2012 and its portfolio of loans to corporate customers went up 32 percent, compared to the previous year. The bank’s assets increased by 8.5 percent last year. In 2012, CEC Bank increased the number of individual customers by around 100,000, while the number of corporate clients also went up by some 15,000. The Romanian lender has a total of 3.3 million individual customers and 147,000 corporate clients, over 1,100 agencies and branches and around 6,540 employees. Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com (photo source: the bank)