The European Investment Bank (EIB) is providing a EUR 150m global loan to PKO BP for financing small and medium-scale projects primarily in the public sector. The supported projects will be mostly in the field of environmental protection, energy savings, health and education infrastructure, industry and services in Poland.

This is already the third global loan with PKO group, bringing the total amount of EIB loans via PKO group to EUR 466m. The EIB global loans in Poland are crucial to enable banks to provide longer term financing, which is not always readily available on the domestic market. The EIB involvement will generate positive effects both in terms of availability of long-term funding and overall financing costs.

The final beneficiaries of the EIB support are mainly local authorities and regions. Thanks to the loan, the Polish regional and municipal infrastructure sector will be further developed through the part-financing of investments related to sustainable development and environment, sustainable urban transport, renewable energy and energy efficiency.

At the end of 2012, the EIB was allocating loans in Poland through 15 intermediaries (of which 5 are leasing companies), which are active both in the public and private sector. Through such a diversified counterpart base, including also smaller financial institutions, the EIB encourages competition among financial intermediaries, which benefits the promoters of small projects.