According to him, the bank has set itself the goal of increasing the volume of new business to CZK 7.5 billion this year. “The improvement in results is mainly due to business activity,” said Krumpolc. According to him, it was defensive in previous years because the bank was trying to clean up its loan portfolio. Now the share of loans in borrower default has fallen below two percent. “The overwhelming majority of the bank is cleared in terms of loans,” he added.
Krumpolc believes that the trend has been reversed and the process of transforming ČEB into an active financial institution has begun. Compared to the pre-covid year 2019, ČEB reduced the number of employees by twenty percent and operating costs by 15 percent. The bank does not receive any subsidies from the state for its operation, he pointed out.
Last year, ČEB focused mainly on supporting Czech companies in their international expansion and investments abroad. Loans for investments abroad made up two thirds of the volume of products provided. In several important transactions, ČEB was invited to the club of leading Czech and international banks.
“That’s exactly how it should work. We are not a competitor of the commercial banking sector, we only complement it. Our main competition is foreign export banks and agencies that support exports in competing economies,” Krumpolc pointed out.
New products related to the recent amendment to the Act on insurance and financing of exports with state support should also help ČEB to further grow. The bank is now able to support Czech companies whose exports represent at least a quarter of their annual sales and which need to invest and thus strengthen their international competitiveness. ČEB can provide such companies with financing, bank guarantees and other products focused on digitization, the acquisition of new technologies, the purchase of raw materials and subcontracts or, for example, the greening of production and the reduction of energy consumption.
ČEB was established in 1995 and is part of the state pro-export policy system. Since then, it has supported over 1,860 business cases in more than 94 countries in a volume exceeding 380 billion crowns. The bank’s mission is to support Czech exports and awareness of the Czech Republic in the world.
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