InvestEU - Performance

Programme in a nutshell

Concrete examples of achievements (*)

Budget for 2021-2027

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Rationale and design of the programme

The InvestEU programme aims to ensure an additional boost to investments fostering recovery, resilience, green growth and employment in the EU over the 2021-2027 period. This goal is achieved by mobilising public and private financing sources, in order to provide long-term funding and support to companies and projects in line with the EU priorities in the current challenging economic and social context. 

Furthermore, InvestEU will be an important vehicle to implement the REPowerEU Plan as well as the Green Deal Industrial Plan, aiming to accelerate clean tech and industrial innovation to reach the EU’s 2030 clean energy targets. 

Budget

Budget programming (million EUR):

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  Financial programming:
  + EUR 380.1 million (+ 12%)
  compared to the legal basis*

^{* Top-ups pursuant to Article 5 of the multiannual financial framework regulation are excluded from financial programming in this comparison.}

• Compared to the reference amount from the legal basis (EUR 3 067.71 million), the InvestEU appropriations include the amounts for 2021 and 2023 stemming from (i) the Cohesion and other additional Member State contributions to the InvestEU Fund under the Member State compartments and to the InvestEU Advisory Hub, (ii) the EFTA contributions as well as (iii) the assigned revenues (reflows) from the predecessor legacy instruments for the InvestEU Fund. In addition, InvestEU contributed about EUR 372 million for the European Investment Fund (EIF) capital increase, in 2021, as planned under the InvestEU regulation.  
• The frontloading of the financial programming of the InvestEU programme is mainly related to the strict deadlines applicable to the Next Generation EU (NGEU) funds, under which implementing partners need to approve financing and investment operations corresponding to 60% of the NGEU budget by the end of 2022 and to 100% of the NGEU budget by the end of 2023. Also, overall considering the narrow ceilings over the whole multiannual financial framework period, it was necessary to start building up the provisioning in the first 3 years to spread this over the whole period while respecting the annual ceilings of the multiannual financial framework. 
• On top of the 7 guarantee agreements signed with implementing partners in 2022 amounting to EUR 21 billion, the Commission has signed guarantee agreements under EU Compartment with seven new implementing partners in 2023 for a total guarantee amount of more than EUR 1.9 billion. Moreover, eight amendments of guarantee agreements were signed with existing implementing partners in 2023. 
• An amount of EUR 257.7 million were transferred to InvestEU in 2023 including: (i) EUR 201 million under the InvestEU Guarantee – Greece, Finland, Bulgaria, Malta and Romania compartments of the CPF, (ii) EUR 2.93 million under the InvestEU Advisory Hub as external assigned revenues from Greece for the Member State compartment, and (iii) EUR 53.77 million in commitment appropriations from the EFTA countries (Norway and Iceland) for the InvestEU Fund, the Portal and ancillary measures and the support expenditure budget. 

Budget performance – implementation

Multiannual cumulative implementation rate at the end of 2022 (million EUR):

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Annual voted budget implementation (million EUR)⁽¹⁾:

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Contribution to horizontal priorities

Green budgeting

Contribution to green budgeting priorities (million EUR):

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• InvestEU places significant emphasis on investments that have a positive impact on the climate and the environment. The programme aims to allocate 30% of its overall financial envelope to climate objectives, while 60% of investments from the sustainable infrastructure window will support the EU objectives on climate and the environment. These targets provide strong incentives for financial institutions to develop financial products, in line with the climate ambition of the programme. 
• Overall, InvestEU is expected to help mobilise more than EUR 110 billion to meet EU climate goals. For example, at present, the European Investment Bank is already deploying a dedicated ‘green transition product’. The Nordic Investment Bank will provide loan financing to several renewable energy projects (notably wind power) in the Nordic and Baltic countries. 
• To guide the implementation of the InvestEU financial products, the Commission has published sustainability proofing guidance (3) and climate- and environment-tracking guidance (4). Investments above EUR 10 million will be subject to sustainability proofing to identify, assess and mitigate climate, environmental or social risks. All InvestEU-supported investment will be tracked in terms of environmental and climate impact against the methodology issued by the Commission. Both guidance documents integrate, where possible, the EU taxonomy framework. InvestEU implementing partners have a choice to track the achievement of the climate and environmental targets under the sustainable infrastructure window using the EU-taxonomy-aligned criteria or the InvestEU climate and environmental markers. As of 31 December 2023, 36% of the aggregate InvestEU signed financing was tracked using EU-taxonomy-aligned criteria for the purpose of the determination of the climate and environmental objectives (5). The EU-taxonomy-compliant financing for the implementing partners who use the EU-taxonomy-aligned criteria amounts to 80% of their volume of signed InvestEU operations. 
• For the purpose of clean air tracking, InvestEU assigns a 40% coefficient to the amounts reported on climate mitigation and pollution interventions, which amounts to EUR 8 554.72 million of signed InvestEU financing supporting these specific objectives. Therefore, the estimated EU contribution to clean air stands at EUR 539.14 million. 
• The reported investment on biodiversity (amounting to EUR 37.6 million) results in an estimated EU contribution of EUR 5.92 million. 
• In addition to these ambitious climate targets, the InvestEU Fund set up a dedicated scheme to generate additional investment for the benefit of just transition territories – those territories that will be the most affected by the socioeconomic consequences of the green transition – as a complement to the Just Transition Fund and the public sector loan facility. The investments supporting just transition backed by InvestEU amount to EUR 1.5 billion as of the end of 2023. 

^{(1) EUR-Lex - 52021XC0713(02) - EN - EUR-Lex (europa.eu).
(2) InvestEU C&E T C_2021_3316_Main & Annexes_EN.pdf (europa.eu).
(3) InvestEU implementation is currently in a ramp-up phase, and the InvestEU climate and environmental targets apply at the end of the signature period. Any results are therefore preliminary indications of the progress made so far.}

Gender

Contribution to gender equality (million EUR) (*):

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• In 2023, the InvestEU programme as a whole obtained a score of 0*. 

• Specific parts of the programme could have received a higher score based on their contribution to gender equality, however the EU budget allocated to these initiatives is not available. These initiatives include the following. 

  • The gender smart advisory initiative, which aims to provide tailored advice and capacity-building to improve access to financing for female-founded and female-led companies. Its key objectives include increasing female representation in the investment community (notably by identifying barriers, strengthening women’s capacity, challenging unconscious biases, etc.), and increasing awareness of the funding gap and of missed opportunities. This will be achieved through the organisation of workshops or networking events and through collaboration with existing initiatives of the Commission, the European Investment Bank Group or the wider entrepreneurship and investment community. 

  • European Investment Fund equity financing, where gender smart financing is one of the horizontal topics implemented across the different thematic policy areas supported by the fund’s equity products: 

    • the infrastructure and climate funds product of the sustainable infrastructure window / social investment and skills window;  
    • the intermediated equity product of the joint ‘Small and medium-sized enterprises / research, innovation and digitalisation’ window;  
    • the social impact equity product of the social investment and skills window. 

    The Commission and the European Investment Fund defined gender criteria with respect to equity intermediaries, focusing on leadership aspects captured at different levels. If an intermediary complies with these criteria, InvestEU can finance up to 50% of the total commitments of the fund (as opposed to 25%). 

  In addition, the indicative goal of the joint ‘Small and medium-sized enterprises / research, innovation and digitalisation’ window intermediated equity product (under which the European Investment Fund is expected to build a portfolio of investments of around EUR 5.5 billion) is for 25% of all its intermediaries to follow InvestEU’s leadership gender criteria, including (1) a management team composed of at least one third of female partners, (2) 40% female representation in the senior investment team, and (3) at least 40% female representation in the investment committee. 

Digital

Contribution to digital transition (million EUR):

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^{(*) The digital contribution of InvestEU is estimated by dividing the mobilised amount of investment supporting digitalisation by the overall InvestEU multiplier (i.e., the ratio between expected investment mobilised and the total amount of the EU guarantee under InvestEU) and by multiplying the result by the average InvestEU provisioning rate of 40%.}

• As of the end of 2023, InvestEU had mobilised EUR 6.58 billion worth of operations supporting digitalisation. 
• The EUR 3.64 billion allocated to the ‘Innovation and digitalisation guarantee’ financial product of the SMEs window will support innovation- and digitalisation-driven SMEs and small mid-caps. The EU guarantee will support, among other things, innovative business models, supply chain management, the acquisition of digital skills and support to service providers that enable and support companies in the digitalisation of value chains, as long as these service providers focus predominantly on the provision and adoption of digital products and services. 
• Moreover, the joint ‘Small and medium-sized enterprises / research, innovation and digitalisation’ window equity product to be implemented by the European Investment Fund includes a sub-product that supports investments fostering the development of digital, cultural and creative industry solutions. 
• Almost all financial products of implementing partners supported by the InvestEU Fund address several policy goals allowing for synergies between them. Implementing partners notably provide finance for investments that target research and climate action, social infrastructure and energy efficiency, SMEs and research/ innovation or infrastructure and digitalisation. Gender equality is applied as a horizontal priority throughout the intermediated equity products, combined for example with climate or social infrastructure goals of investment funds.    

Budget performance – outcomes

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• The performance of the InvestEU programme must be measured against the fact that the InvestEU regulation was adopted with some delay in March 2021. Based on this and due to other circumstances, most of the guarantee agreements with implementing partners under the InvestEU Fund were only signed in late 2022 and during 2023. Therefore, financing for investments supported by the EU guarantee has progressed, but the impact of supported investments and their concrete contribution to InvestEU objectives, as captured by the key performance indicators, will only be visible at a later stage. 
• Implementing partners other than the European Investment Bank Group have been selected through a public call for expression of interest, followed by negotiations of individual guarantee agreements. Opening up the InvestEU programme to other implementing partners than the European Investment Bank Group widens the geographical coverage of the InvestEU programme, expands the pipeline of projects seeking financing and diversifies the risk at both the portfolio and the programme levels. 
• In 2023, the Investment Committee of the InvestEU Fund held 12 operational meetings, approving an EU guarantee amount of EUR 9.7 billion for 120 operations (including framework operations) coming from all the implementing partners, with a majority from the European Investment Bank Group. Furthermore, in 2023 10 operations under the InvestEU Member State compartment were approved (from Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Finland). 
• By the end of 2023, the InvestEU programme had enabled the implementing partners to approve EUR 42.9 billion for investment operations (including framework operations), of which EUR 19.2 billion have already been signed. Financing provided by the InvestEU implementing partners included investments in key policy areas of the InvestEU programme under all four policy windows, supporting financing for renewable energy, research, development and innovation, and production of low-carbon technologies, support for SMEs as well as social infrastructure and social impact investments. Those investments financed with InvestEU support directly contribute to the EU's policy objectives in the area of low-carbon energy, energy security and accelerating the green transition, thus helping to reach the policy goals stipulated in the repowerEU plan. 
• In addition to the climate-related results of the InvestEU programme (i.e. a 53.47% InvestEU contribution to climate objectives as of the end of 2023 based on the volume of signed operations), the implementing partners will also report on the estimated reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and energy savings. At the end of 2023, implementing partners estimated that the operations funded with the support of InvestEU will avoid 20.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, while generating an estimated 230.7 million kilowatt-hours of energy savings (²⁵). An illustrative example of a climate related project supported under InvestEU which contributes to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions is ‘H2Battery’, which focused on a technology that provides a fully flexible, efficient and scalable integrated battery and electrolyser solution. 
• As part of the planned roll-out of InvestEU, a number of financial products established under InvestEU would allow specific support for investments in the digital transition. At the end of 2023, an estimated EUR 6.58 billion of investment had been mobilised to support digitalisation. Projects include network expansion to provide fibre connectivity, like ‘Odyssey Network Expansion’ in Ireland and ‘Fibre Optic Network Expansion Poland’, along with investments in funds targeting the digital economy or financing schemes to support medium-sized enterprises and small mid-caps to help with their digital and environmental changeover. 
• Measures have been taken to accelerate the financing of investments by implementing partners. These include the ‘warehousing’ of eligible financing and investment operations signed by the European Investment Bank Group and other implementing partners before the signature of the guarantee agreement, along with the use of framework operations for projects that have similar characteristics. 
• The Commission supports the implementation of InvestEU through a number of communication activities, particularly those shown below. 
  • Press releases, memos and replies to journalists. 
  • Social media posts and the dedicated InvestEU website (https://investeu.europa.eu/index_en). 
  • InvestEU ‘roadshow’ events organised virtually and/or physically in each Member State, in collaboration with the European Investment Bank Group and other implementing partners. There were 23 roadshow events in 2022 and another nine in 2023, and these events also included Iceland and Norway. 
  • The first InvestEU success story video was produced in 2023, covering case studies from the fund and the advisory hub across different sectors and Member States. 
  • A bi-monthly InvestEU newsletter has been circulated since 2023, informing readers about newly approved and signed projects, programme implementation updates and InvestEU-related events. 
• A dedicated high-level event, ‘InvestEU: Financing Europe’s Future’, took place on 23 January 2024 in Brussels, Belgium. After the launch of the InvestEU programme in March 2021, the event in January 2024 showcased the first achievements and early impacts of the programme, based on feedback from implementing partners, beneficiaries and stakeholder organisations. 
• Concerning the InvestEU Advisory Hub, the advisory agreement with the European Investment Bank was signed in March 2022. Advisory agreements with Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (Italian National Promotional Institution), Bpifrance and the Caisse des Depôts et Consignations (France) were signed between July and November 2022. Additional agreements with the Council of Europe Development Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development were signed in early 2023. Also in 2023, the hub dealt with more than 1 300 requests coming directly from the central entry point for advisory requests or sourced by the advisory partners themselves. More than 800 of them have already been turned into ongoing or completed advisory assignments. 
• The InvestEU Portal website was launched in April 2021. In 2023, 643 new projects were received, out of which 468 projects were published. By the end of 2023, the portal had provided access to 1 518 investment opportunities and more than 140 projects had received financing after being published on the portal. The portal co-organised two major events with the European Business Angels Network, which brought together more than 600 business leaders, early-stage investors, business angels, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, accelerators, seed funds and start-ups. In addition, four virtual e-pitching events were held in cooperation with EuroQuity on the following subjects: digital economy and technologies, climate technology solutions, women entrepreneurs in health technology and the circular economy, energy and sustainable solutions. Communication efforts and promotional activities are ongoing to improve the visibility of the portal, such as the participation and co-organisation of matchmaking events and other campaigns. 

Contribution to the sustainable development goals