SURE - European Commission

SURE is the EU programme to finance short-term employment schemes across the EU and keep people in jobs during the coronavirus pandemic.

On 7^th December 2022, the EU issued its last bond under SURE, raising €6.55 billion through a 15-year social bond. The transaction brought the total funding raised under the programme to €98.4 billion, out of a maximum funding envelope of €100 billion (available only until the end of 2022).

All SURE funds were raised through back-to-back issuance of SURE social bonds. This saw the Commission become one of the world’s most significant Environmental, social, and governance (ESG)-label issuers, with SURE social bonds accounting for 16% of global social bond issuance in 2021.

The Commission started issuing social bonds in October 2020, following the adoption of an independently evaluated Social Bond Framework. The framework is compliant with the Social Bond Principles of the International Capital Market Association (ICMA).

The first SURE transaction was record-breaking, attracting an order book of €233 billion, the largest order book for any deal in the history of global bond markets.

Between October 2020 and December 2022, the Commission issued a total of €98.4 billion of social bonds in 9 issuances. The programme has thus been completed, becoming ending as the world’s largest social bond scheme.

SURE disbursements

An overview of the funds disbursed via SURE over the lifetime of the instrument is available here:

15 DECEMBER 2022

SURE - Disbursements under various bond maturities

SURE reporting

The Commission has on 2 June published the fifth and final bi-annual report on the implementation and impact of SURE following the end of the instrument on 31 December 2022.

It confirmed that SURE supported some 31.5 million employees and self-employed people and over 2.5 million firms in 2020. The instrument helped the rapid economic rebound in 2021, which was faster than in previous crises.

2 JUNE 2023

Fifth and final bi-annual report on the implementation of SURE

Reports 1 to 4 are available online below.

23 SEPTEMBER 2022

Fourth report on the implementation of SURE

24 MARCH 2022

Third report on the implementation of SURE

22 SEPTEMBER 2021

Second report on the implementation of SURE

22 MARCH 2021

First report on the implementation of SURE

Documents

All documents linked to the EU SURE Social Bond Framework are available in the documents' section of our website.

Disclaimer

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