EBRD invests record €16.8 billion in 2025

This article is brought to you in association with EBRD.

• EBRD marks record year with €16.8 billion in Annual Bank Investment in 2025
• Bank maintains strong support for the private sector, accounting for 75 per cent of investments
• €2.9 billion deployed in Ukraine

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) invested a record €16.8 billion across its regions in 2025 and signed its first projects in sub-Saharan Africa and Iraq.

The Bank financed 640 projects over the course of the year, with 75 per cent of investments in the private sector, equating to €12.7 billion in private-sector investment.

EBRD President Odile Renaud-Basso said: “2025 was a year of continuing challenges, but also many striking achievements. I am proud that the Bank delivered unprecedented support to Ukraine, while fuelling private-sector development, enhancing competitiveness and boosting growth across our economies.

“At the same time, our first-ever investments in sub-Saharan Africa and Iraq marked a historic milestone, extending the EBRD’s reach to new markets.”

The Bank had previously delivered a then record €16.6 billion in investment across its economies in 2024, with record shares of private-sector, green and human capital development-linked investments.

While growth in most EBRD regions picked up in 2025, a number of economies continued to shoulder the burden of high public debt and high government interest payments.

Despite ongoing global tensions and inflationary pressures across its regions, the Bank continued to deliver on its strategic priorities, channelling 56 per cent of total investment, or €9.4 billion, to projects supporting the green transition in its investee economies. Forty-seven per cent of projects advanced opportunities for women across the EBRD regions. Six per cent of all annual investments took place in equity. The Bank’s annual mobilised investment was €5.7 billion. Total mobilisation was €26.8 billion. Annual disbursements reached a record €11.5 billion, exceeding 2024’s level of €10.6 billion.

The record performance in 2025 came amid a strong year for EBRD support in Ukraine. The Bank’s deployment of financing this year reached €2.9 billion, with funds channelled to critical infrastructure, energy security and the private sector. 

Among the highlights of the Bank’s support for Ukraine last year was a €770 million financing package to Naftogaz, which included a €500 million loan to help replenish gas reserves ahead of the winter – the largest-ever EBRD loan to the country.

Other significant projects included a €300 million EBRD financing package for the country’s state-owned railway operator, portfolio risk-sharing facilities for Ukreximbank to unlock €200 million in new lending to Ukrainian borrowers, and a €100 million loan facility to support the development of a scalable and affordable housing platform in Ukraine.

The Bank launched its first-ever investment in sub-Saharan Africa – a €30 million sovereign loan to Benin’s Société Béninoise d’Énergie Électrique, the national power distribution company, a significant step in supporting the rural electrification.

Another first investment was launched in Iraq, where the Bank provided a US$ 100 million trade finance facility to the National Bank of Iraq, the country’s largest private bank. The new trade finance limit will contribute to boosting the country’s import and export activities. The Bank also joined forces with the European Union (EU) to expand support for the private sector in the West Bank by launching a financing facility there.

In 2025 the EBRD succeeded in mobilising nearly €1.9 billion in new donor funds, including unfunded guarantees. Over €859 million of these new donor resources were utilised in Ukraine. The EU provided 55 per cent of all donor resources.

In 2025 shareholders also approved the EBRD’s Strategic and Capital Framework (SCF) for 2026-30, with its central strategic objective being the continuation of the Bank’s exceptional support for Ukraine both in wartime and during post-war reconstruction.

The framework identifies three core themes for the Bank, namely: the green transition, economic governance and promoting human capital development.

Strengthening economic governance is key to the EBRD’s mission, and Ukraine’s adoption of revised nomination rules in the governance bodies of public companies – developed with the Bank’s support – is the latest example of this work.

The EBRD’s performance in individual economies and regions will be announced later this month and its overall financial results for last year will be published in spring.