EBRD’s investments in Romania exceeded half billion euro in 2014

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development expanded investments in Romania last year to 592 million euro, 16.5 percent more than in 2013 when the financial institution’s funding added up to 508 million euro, while the number of operations decreased from 32 to 26 in 2014, shows a press release.

Overall, the EBRD financing rose to 8.9 billion euro from 8.5 billion euro in 2013, although investments in Russia, one of the major beneficiaries, saw a sharp drop in investments which stood at 608 million euro, about three times below the previous year volume.

“The EBRD’s investments increased in 2014 as emerging economies continued to suffer due to events surrounding Russia and Ukraine, a stubborn lack of recovery in the eurozone and the global market turbulence that erupted towards the end of the year”, states the mentioned source.

Even so, Russia was among the top three countries given the inflows of EBRD investments, after Ukraine (1.2 billion euro) and Turkey (almost 1.4 billion euro), which became the largest individual recipient of EBRD financing.

Romania ranks the sixth in terms of investments volume, closely behind Poland (594 million euro) and Egypt (593 million euro). While in Egypt the EBRD increased its investment strongly, Poland benefitted from lower amounts, in spite of an increased number of projects financed.

To date, the EBRD has invested nearly 7 billion euro across 366 projects in the country. It has also mobilized over 14 billion euro for these ventures from other sources of financing.