The President of the European Investment Bank, Werner Hoyer, participated at the margin of the IMF / World Bank spring meetings at a panel discussion “The Way Forward for the Eurozone and Europe: A Conversation with European Policymakers”.

The discussion was organised by the Brookings Institution, a highly renowned think tank in Washington. It was the first time that the five European institutions – the European Central Bank, the European Stability Mechanism, the European Commission, the President of the Euro Finance Ministers and the EIB - presented to an international audience their coherent strategy to overcome the current sovereign debt crisis.

President Hoyer underlined that in times when the banking sector is deleveraging, the EIB is playing an ever more important role by significantly stepping up its lending activities to almost EUR 70 bn per year during 2013 to 2015.

In addition he emphasised that the EIB will ensure the most effective response addressing specific investment needs by using new financial instruments to alleviate financial constraints, in particular for small and medium sized enterprises. As examples he mentioned the Greek Trade Finance Facility and the Portuguese Portfolio State Guarantee.

But he made also clear that the EIB is the EU-Bank and not the bank of the Eurozone. He reiterated that the EIB is paying highest attention to a high-quality loan book, a conservative risk management and strict internal regulatory compliance rules.