Creative Europe launches €121m guarantee facility

The European Commission and the European Investment Fund (EIF) have launched a €121 million guarantee initiative to support SMEs in the cultural and creative sectors via financial institutions.

This scheme is expected to create more than €600 million worth of bank loans over the next six years.

This initiative allows the EIF to provide guarantees and counter-guarantees, free of charge, to selected financial intermediaries in order to enable them to provide more debt finance to entrepreneurs in the cultural and creative arena. Guarantee institutions, commercial and promotional banks as well as other financial intermediaries benefiting from the €121 million guarantee will support more than ten thousand SMEs in a wide range of sectors such as audiovisual (including film, television, animation, video games and multimedia), festivals, music, literature, architecture, archives, libraries and museums, artistic crafts, cultural heritage, design, performing arts, publishing, radio and visual arts.

The new Cultural and Creative Sectors Guarantee Facility includes capacity building activities for financial intermediaries, giving them specific expertise on key elements of these sectors (e.g. specific business models and credit risk assessment in the sectors). Capacity building would be provided by (a) capacity building provider(s) selected by the EIF (e.g. a consultancy company specialised in the way the cultural and creative sectors work) following an open call for tenders. Such training will be free of charge for financial intermediaries.

EIF published a call for expression of interest to which eligible financial institutions (banks, guarantee institutions, leasing companies, etc.) will be able to apply. After a thorough selection process, the EIF will select financial intermediaries which can then make the new finance available to SMEs in the targeted sectors.



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