Jean-Christophe Laloux’s Post

Very proud to announce that we have signed our first loan under our European Investment Bank (EIB)'s "Scale Up debt" initiative. European fast growing companies need more patient and local equity-type financing. We, in Europe, are at a structural disadvantage compared to our international competitors in this field, in part due to the fragmentation of our capital markets. Let's keep doing more like this!

Today in sunny Barcelona with a strong European Investment Bank (EIB) team at the Global ABS 2024 conference. There is definitely movement and appetite for change from market participants on the front of the Capital Market Union and the securitization market. There is little doubt in anybody’s mind that finance at larger scale is a pre-condition for European companies to bridge their negative gap in productivity and growth on the world scene. Securitization is one of the means that exists to channel more savings and institutional funds to areas at present covered in large majority by banks, in isolation to other financial actors. Banco Santander gave practical examples of how securitizations (supported by European Investment Bank (EIB) and European Investment Fund (EIF)) help them provide more loans to productive companies in Europe. Time for action, at political and regulatory level, but also at transactional level. Birthe Bruhn-Léon, CFA Gemma Feliciani Karoly Taksz Saiyi Suzuki Navarro Frank Lee Dr. Björn Bronger, EMBA Erik Welin, CFA Alessandro Tappi and the other colleagues present today.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) supports our mid-sized European companies in their efforts to remain competitive on the world markets through investments in Research and Development, also in traditional industrial sectors. We grant flexible, long term and tightly priced loans that allow to push back the reimbursement efforts and maximise the capital expenditure. Well done to my colleagues, Antonio Lorenzo, Gilles Badot, Henrique Bonfim and Martina Rosato on this new loan to CIE Automotive in Spain.

Was invited today at the Energy Governors’ meeting of the World Economic Forum by Christian Bruch, to present the perspective of the European Investment Bank (EIB) in financing the energy transtition. I insisted on the progress made on the European continent, and our achievements under #repowerEU, with over 20 billion euros per year invested by European Investment Bank (EIB) alone in Renewable Energy, Energy Efficiency and Research and Development in the field. This includes also our special effort for the European wind industry. I mentioned also areas where we need to progress further: interconnections, access to finance for non-ionvestment grade borrowers closing on PPAs, financing of innovation in grid management systems. Further, I noted the vibrant call of several participants for more European presence outside of EU borders, in particular in Central Asia, where there is a notable absence of European equity investors and project developers. This will, undoubtedly, be picked up by EIB Global | BEI Monde in the context of future financing operations.

Was yesterday in Brussels with Commisssioner Kadri Simson at the European Commission to celebrate the second anniversary of RepowerEU. We have achieved a lot already, partly thanks to European Investment Bank (EIB) and our 22 billion euros n new loans signed in 2023 alone for the sector of renewable energy and energy efficiency. Let’s keep on accelerating!

Today was the @Venture Debt summit organised by the European Investment Bank (EIB), in close collaboration with the European Investment Fund (EIF) and the European Commission. We welcomed more than 250 participants from all across Europe, which lead to many interesting and concrete investment discussions. My key messages to the audience this morning: 1 In Europe, we may have bridged part of our gap towards the US in the field of venture capital equity finance, we still have a long way to go as far as downstream scale-up finance is concerned. 2 We must accelerate the pace of investment in key sector for tomorrow’s EU competitiveness: #deeptech, #lifesciences and #cleantech. 3 Make use of the advisory services offered by the European Investment Bank (EIB), funded by the European Commission under #InvestEU. They can make a difference to attract investors. Let’s make more innovation happen in Europe!