The European Commission has approved Romanian state support for its national investment and development bank, Banca de Investiții și Dezvoltare S.A. (BID), including a €1 billion capital increase and a longer-running state guarantee.
The approval covers a €1 billion capital boost for BID, part of which will be funded by the EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) — a post-pandemic funding programme that provides grants and loans to member states, the Commission reported on Friday.
Romania’s plan includes a €100 million contribution financed through an RRF loan.
The Commission also cleared a three-year extension of the state guarantee backing BID’s operations, pushing its expiry from 2028 to 31 December 2032.
BID was set up in 2022 to complement commercial banks and provide financing to businesses and projects that struggle to obtain funding on the market.
Broader remit for BID
Alongside the extra capital and guarantee, the Commission approved an expansion of BID’s mandate beyond what was authorised in January 2023, when it cleared a Romanian measure to set up the bank with initial capital of €1.6 billion.
BID provides loans, guarantees and equity financing — funding provided in return for an ownership stake — with a focus on small and medium-sized enterprises and innovative start-ups.
The extended scope allows BID to support scale-up companies and projects in strategic sectors including defence, high-tech manufacturing, high-tech knowledge-intensive industries and cybersecurity.
The measures were assessed under EU state aid rules, which restrict government support that could distort competition and trade within the bloc, and were approved under Article 107(3)(c) of the EU treaty provisions governing state aid.
