The AECM's annual seminar on "The SME regulatory framework: how familiar are we with bureaucracy?"

The "closed" annual meeting of the European Association of Guarantee Institutions (AECM ) will be held for the first time in Athens, at Radisson Blu Park Hotel , from 15 to 17 June 2023.

The meeting will include the AECM's annual seminar on "The SME regulatory framework: how familiar are we with bureaucracy?".

Participants coming to Athens from various countries will have the opportunity to learn and discuss all the developments concerning the future and the challenges of SMEs .

The meeting, as well as the conference, will be attended by members of the management and top executives of guarantors from around the world.

AECM has 47 members in 30 different countries. All its members have common mission to support small and medium-sized enterprises and provide loan guarantees. Since its creation in 1992, it has provided guarantees to more than 5.9 million SMEs. This represents more than 25% of all SMEs in Europe.

The General Assembly, as well as the AECM's Annual Session, are hosted in Athens, by the Hellenic Development Bank (HDB), which is represented in its management by the Managing Director, Ms Athena Hadjipetrou.

The financial programmes of the EBA for the AECM

Recently, the Hellenic Development Bank announced four financing programmes totalling 2.5 billion. euro included in the initiative Know your customer . The programme will provide access to bank lending to 60,000 SMEs that are healthy and up-to-date but have been excluded from banks because of their size. The Know your customer platform will be interconnected with AADE, EFKA and Tiresias in order to certify the tax, insurance and solvency of the businesses concerned. On the same platform, entrepreneurs will submit their business plans in a standardised form and indicate the banks they want to approach and there will be safeguards to ensure that banks respond.