AfE 2024
It is hardly surprising that an Italian bank should excel at lending to small and medium-sized enterprises, which are the backbone of the industrial strategy of the country. SMEs are at the heart of UniCredit’s UniCredit per l’Italia strategy, which has seen a further €10 billion of support extended to individuals and corporates this year – including a special assistance package for Emilia Romagna in May in response to widespread flooding.
The bank, which has a 20% share of the SME wallet in Italy, launched two further initiatives in December, approving €200 million of loans and €100 million of minibonds for SMEs under the Fondo Centrale di Garanzia scheme. The bank also eliminated point-of-sale fees for merchants with turnovers of under €1 million for transactions up to €10 carried out at physical sale points in a one-year initiative that ran until June 2024.