Call for Expression of Interest JER-004/6 to select Financial Intermediaries that will receive resources from the EIF, acting through the JEREMIE Holding Fund for Lithuania, to implement the First Loss Portfolio Guarantee Financial Instrument for Leasing.
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Applicant |
means a Financial Intermediary applying to this Call for Expression of Interest; |
Business Day |
means a day during which EIF Luxembourg office is open, and banks are open for general business in Lithuania and Luxembourg; |
Deadline |
means 19 September 2011; |
Eligibility Criteria |
means the criteria with which the Expressions of Interest and the Applicants must comply with and which are listed in Annex 2 hereof; |
Expression of Interest |
means a proposal sent by an Applicant in response to this Call for Expression of Interest, within the Deadline, to be drafted in accordance with the template attached hereto as Annex 1; |
JEREMIE |
means the initiative “Joint European Resources for Micro to Medium Enterprises” launched by the Commission and EIF, as member of the European Investment Bank Group, in order to promote increased access to finance for the development of SMEs in the European Union; |
EIB Group |
The EIB Group consists of the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Investment Fund (EIF); |
JHF |
means the EIF in its capacity acting through the JEREMIE Holding Fund for Lithuania, appointed under the Funding Agreement; |
Operational Agreement or Guarantee Agreement |
means an agreement entered into between a Financial Intermediary and EIF on behalf of the JHF regarding a Financial Instrument on the basis of this Call for Expression of Interest and the selection process; |
Quality Assessment Criteria |
means the quality assessment criteria applied by EIF at the sole discretion of EIF to the suitability of the Applicant and/or the proposed Financial Instrument according to the business standards of EIF and which are listed in Annex 2 hereof; |
Selection Criteria |
means the Eligibility Criteria and the Quality Assessment Criteria; |
Small and Medium-sized Enterprises or SMEs |
means micro, small and medium-sized enterprises as defined in the Commission Recommendation 2003/361/EC, as implemented by the Law of the Republic of Lithuania on Small and Medium-sized Business Development No VIII-935. |
It is planned to allocate out of the JHF an amount up to EUR 10m to the Financial Instrument, which should generate a portfolio volume of over EUR 50m of new financial leases to SMEs. See below list of indicative allocation and the relevant Annex setting out the Selection Criteria and the description of the Financial Instrument.
Financial Instrument |
Indicative capital allocation range (millions EUR) |
Applicable Annexes |
First Loss Portfolio Guarantee on a portfolio of SME transactions |
Up to 10 |
Annex 2 (Financial Instrument: Description and Selection Criteria) |
The indicative capital allocated to the Financial Instrument, as well as the amounts available for contribution by the JHF to the selected Financial Intermediary, may be changed as necessary, at EIF’s sole discretion, particularly if the funding available changes during the JHF implementation process or the demand for the Financial Instrument so requires. Also, during implementation process of the particular Financial Instrument, EIF may, at its sole discretion, decide to increase commitment to particular Financial Intermediary.
To be noted that joint ventures and/or consortiums can express their interest as long as they indicate/nominate one coordinating entity as a contractual counterpart for the EIF for the entire term of the Operational Agreement (in case of selection) and under the condition that all partners in the relevant joint venture or consortium are credit or financial institutions or leasing companies duly authorised to carry out such activities according to Lithuanian legislation. Such Applicants are required to submit one, joint Expression of Interest, in which the coordinating entity should be indicated.
Until no later than 23/08/2011, the Applicants may request clarifications regarding the Call for Expression of Interest or the nature of the Financial Instrument. Such requests must indicate the Call for Expression of Interest reference number (JER-004/6) and the name of the Applicant and shall be submitted in English via email to:
The Expressions of Interest shall indicate the reference number of the Call (No. JER-004/6) and the name of the Applicant and shall be sent to the following address:
Postal Address:“Expression of Interest - Reference number of the Call (No. JER-004/6) – Not to be opened by the reception – To be passed without opening to Regional Business Development Unit”).
E-mail Address:Prior to the Deadline and in the same manner as specified above, the Applicants may change or amend their Expressions of Interest by clearly indicating the parts to be changed or amended.
Prior or after the Deadline and in the same manner as specified above, the Applicants may withdraw their Expressions of Interest.
After the Deadline, an acknowledgement of receipt will be sent to the relevant Applicants by EIF via e-mail, which shall state the following:
The acknowledgement of receipt shall not be construed as a declaration of completeness of the Expression of Interest and the documents submitted therewith, nor any kind of assessment of the same.
EIF will reject those Expressions of Interest which do not comply with the Eligibility Criteria Financial Intermediaries, whose application is rejected because of non-compliance with any of the elements reflected in the statements regarding situations of exclusion (Appendices 4 and 5 to Annex 1 hereto), may not present themselves for consideration in subsequent Calls for the Expression of Interest unless it is specifically evidenced that the reason for the exclusion no longer exists.
The expiration of the Deadline shall not prevent EIF, in limited cases if deemed necessary, from requesting and receiving from Applicants clarifications on issues of a mere technical or formal nature, provided that such clarifications shall neither provide an opportunity to the respective Applicants to unduly improve their applications nor otherwise distort the competition between the Applicants.
Applicants, which are not excluded according to the Eligibility Criteria and which have been providing the additional information requested from pre-selected applicants as per Appendix 2 within the deadline determined in such request from EIF, will go through the EIF selection process based on the Quality Assessment Criteria. The further selection based on the Quality Assessment Criteria, and the due diligence process, if any, follows the standard procedures and guidelines applied by EIF to its business. The evaluation of proposals at this phase will be conducted under competitive terms and it is envisaged to select up to two Applicants. The third best ranked Application will be considered only if the initial allocation is not absorbed by the first two Applicants. To be noted that in the context of the evaluation procedure, EIF may take negotiation positions, which view specifically at the improvement of the access to finance for the benefit of the final beneficiary SMEs.
Reserve list: Those Applicants who score more than 50 points during the selection process based on the Quality Assessment Criteria but are not selected for contractual negotiations of Operational Agreements will form a reserve list (valid for 1 year following notification of inclusion in the reserve list).
In case more funding becomes available within 1 year from the launching of the Call for Expression of Interest, EIF has the discretion to consider either (i) an increase of the allocations to the Applicant(s) with which EIF has signed an Operational Agreement following the selection process and the contractual negotiations or ii) initiating contractual negotiations with any of the Applicant(s) included in the reserve list taking into consideration the results of the evaluation procedure and the ranking formed.
In any phase of the selection process, EIF reserves itself full discretion to consider Applicants and no Applicant has any claim or other right or may expect to be ultimately selected for financial support by the JHF. Any negotiation of terms and conditions of Operational Agreements by no means entails any obligation for EIF and/or the JHF to enter into such Operational Agreement with the relevant Financial Intermediaries.
Financial Intermediaries, which do not receive contributions from the JHF, are informed accordingly; the reasons for their Expression of Interest being rejected will be clearly communicated to them upon request.
Those Applicants, whose Expression of Interest is rejected, shall have the right to submit a written complaint by e-mail and registered mail or professional courier service, to the same address used for the submission of the Expressions of Interest above, within thirty (30) days of receipt of the letter of rejection. Any complaints will be dealt within the framework and in accordance with the EIB Group complaints policy (for further info visit www.eib.org).
8. Operational Provisions
The Financial Intermediaries, with which Operational Agreements will be eventually signed, shall be required to comply with the EIF anti-fraud policy, and with the relevant monitoring, reporting, publicity and auditing obligations required by the EU regulations applicable to ERDF, and by the Funding Agreement. Such obligations are briefly described in the relevant Financial Instrument description documents, and will be defined in the relevant Operational Agreement.[1] Operational Programme approved by Decision of the European Commission K (2007) 3740 of 30 July 2007.
[2] Council Regulation (EC) No. 1083/2006 of 11 July 2006 laying down general provisions on the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the Cohesion Fund and repealing Regulation (EC) No. 1260/1999 (Official Journal of the European Union L210 of 31.07.2006), as amended from time to time.
[3] Commission Regulation (EC) No 1828/2006 of 8 December 2006 setting out rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006 laying down general provisions on the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the Cohesion Fund and of Regulation (EC) No 1080/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Regional Development Fund (Official Journal of the European Union L371 of 27.12.2006), as amended from time to time, including by Commission Regulation (EC) No 846/2009 of 1 September 2009 amending Regulation (EC) No 1828/2006 setting out rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006 laying down general provisions on the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the Cohesion Fund and of Regulation (EC) No 1080/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Regional Development Fund (Official Journal of the European Union L250 of 23.09.2009).
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