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A significant development.
The Investment Credit Guarantee Fund for SMEs (CGCI-PME) granted guarantees totaling more than 28 billion dinars in 2023, an increase in value of 30%, said Samir Medjkane, Director General of this institution, which intends to increase its volume of activity, as well as its partner banks, thus facilitating the granting of credits to SMEs.
“In 2023, CGCI PME guaranteed 430 credit operations. In terms of activity for the year, the fund recorded a 30% increase in value, or 28 billion dinars of mobilized credits,” he said. According to the head of this establishment, whose capital is held by the Public Treasury and six state banks, the objective for the current year is to increase its volume of activity, expand its network of partner banks and improve the efficiency of these subscription and compensation processes in order to strengthen its role in supporting the development of Algerian SMEs. He said that during the first quarter of 2024, CGCI-PME granted 107 guarantees for a total amount of guaranteed credits of more than 6 billion dinars.
“These figures represent a significant positive development compared to the same period last year, with an increase of 20% in the number of guarantees and 7% in the value of guaranteed credits,” he stressed.
Since its creation in 2006, at the end of 2023, the CGCI-PME has granted cumulative guarantees for more than 4,700 investment projects, equivalent to more than 201 billion dinars.
This reflects “CGCI’s continued commitment to supporting the financing of Algerian SMEs and underlines our crucial role in the development of the national economic fabric, demonstrating the extent of our contribution to facilitating access to credit for businesses,” noted Mr. Medjkane. Regarding the compensation granted by the fund, they amounted to 3.4 billion dinars in 2023 against 1.6 billion dinars in 2022, while they total 288 million dinars in 2021.
Through the guarantees it grants against the payment of a premium of 0.5% of the amount of the credit, the CGCI-PME encourages banks and financial institutions (particularly those operating in leasing) to grant credits to potentially profitable companies. Currently in partnership with all public banks in the area as well as the financial leasing institutions affiliated to them, the CGCI-PME also has private banks in its client portfolio, indicated its director, who notes that the objective is to “expand its scope of action to the entire national banking network to help facilitate the granting of loans to companies.”
Asked about the digitalization of SME credit guarantee procedures, the Director General of the CGCI stated that the latter has already equipped itself with a guarantee subscription platform (the e-guarantee) and that a new version of this platform is being prepared to be deployed during this year.
Operational since June 2023, the pilot version of the e-guarantee already allows four partner banks to “subscribe to the CGCI guarantee in real time. The latter also took care of the exchange of all documents related to the guarantee and compensation including the guarantee application, the amortization table, invoices, the claim declaration form”, according to Mr. Medjkane’s details.
He emphasized the importance of the communication and awareness-raising component for SMEs regarding the vocation of the CGCI-PME as an instrument of the public authorities to support the national policy on business financing and popularize the procedures for subscribing to the guarantee as well as the compensation mechanisms.