Bulgaria's Tourism Shifts Toward Experience-Focused Stays as Demand Grows
Tourism in Bulgaria is increasingly shifting from traditional hotel stays to more experience-focused offerings
Bulgaria’s CIBANK will be able to provide BGN 200 M (around EUR 100 M) in loans to local small and medium enterprises (SMEs) over the next three years under a deal with the European Investment Fund (EIF), the EU Commission has announced.
The EIF and CIBANK have signed the first COSME agreement in Bulgaria, benefiting from the support of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), through which the Investment Plan for Europe is being deployed by the European Commission and the EIB Group, the Commission said in a statement on Friday.
COSME is the EU programme for the Competitiveness of Enterprises and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises running from 2014 - 2020 with a planned budget of EUR 2.3 B.
CIBANK will provide the loans as a result of a guarantee from EIF under the COSME programme with financial backing from the EU Commission. The agreement will make it possible for CIBANK to support additional financing at favourable conditions to over 1,000 SMEs.
“This is fantastic news for Bulgarian businesses and the Bulgarian economy. In a very difficult economic environment we need as much investment as possible,” European Commission Vice-President Kristalina Georgieva commented.
“That is why we're using the EU budget to back BGN 200 million of lending to SMEs. I encourage companies to take advantage of these loans.”
CIBANK CEO Peter Andronov, said at the signing ceremony: "We consider the signing of the COSME guarantee agreement between EIF and CIBANK as a further development of the successful partnership between the two institutions thus providing an opportunity to hundreds of small and medium enterprises to realize their great business ideas at preferential terms of financing."
Bulgaria's Minister of Defense Todor Tagarev admitted the possibility that an explosive device might have been planted on board the crashed plane in which Yevgeny Prigozhin was traveling
The European Commission has announced that it is preparing criminal proceedings against Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece, Malta, and Portugal for incorrect application of the rules on the exchange of data on criminal records and the establishment of the relevant
The European Commission has started an evaluation of the Plan for Reconstruction and Development of Bulgaria, said the spokesman of the European Commission Eric Mamer. The document was submitted to the Commission on 15 October.
58% of Bulgarians do not support the introduction of the euro as the official currency in the country. This shows a study prepared by Trend agency specifically for the financial forum NEXT DIFI 2021, organized by b2b Media for the fifth year. The data dur
Too late Bulgaria began to explain its own position towards North Macedonia, as it should have been clear to our European partners some time ago.
An SPD-led government in Germany has significant potential to sharpen international attention to the problems of corruption in Bulgaria.
Bulgaria's Perperikon: A European Counterpart to Peru's Machu Picchu
Bulgarians Among EU's Least Frequent Vacationers, Struggling with Affordability