The ecological transition is gaining ground in companies and has begun to gain strength. More and more organizations choose to follow the sustainable path and the brick sector is not far behind. In order to promote it, the ‘joint venture’ of Banco Santander and BNP Paribas, Real Estate Credit Union (UCI), has created a mortgage securitization fund that seeks to build and rehabilitate ‘green’ homes. As the information has been able to confirm, the Green Prado XI fund aims to close 4,000 new loans in the next five years.
The vehicle It has almost 500 million euros to invest, and the average amount of mortgage loans will vary depending on the project. A few days ago the Official Credit Institute (ICO) and the EIB Group– made up of the European Investment Bank and the European Investment Fund – decided to join this initiative and inject 340 million euros into the fund. This is the first operation carried out jointly by these entities and they will securitize a portfolio of 490 million euros in green residential mortgages between Spain and Portugal.
The deputy director general of finance of UCI, Phillipe Laportehas commented to this newspaper that these processes are a ‘win-win for all the institutions that make up the investment vehicle and that they go hand in hand with the green projects that the entity has started in the joint venture between Santander and BNP Paribas since the year 2020. “In the end, the investment they make goes directly to the real economy, financing energy improvement operations both for the rehabilitation of buildings and for the acquisition of new green housing”, he says.
The EIB and the ICO, who already each support sustainable projects on their own, will distribute their investments: 200 million have already been disbursed by the European Bank, 40 million will be provided by the EIF in the coming weeks. For its part, the public business entity attached to the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation through the Secretary of State for the Economy and Business Support, will put on the table another 100 million to support this energy efficiency, renewable energy and sustainable urban transport project.
A few weeks ago the European Investment Bank closed an agreement with the Community of Madrid to build and rehabilitate public educational centers to make them more sustainable. Isabel Díaz Ayuso obtained 250 million for these infrastructures that must comply with the regulations to increase the energy efficiency of these facilities and remain aligned with the Paris Agreement. The entity based in Luxembourg has given a loan of almost 10,000 million to Spain, where more than half of those credits are to support climate actions and the transition; that is to say, 5,182 million (52% of the funds) are for renewable energy projects, energy efficiency, among others.
The EIB has contributed more than 5,000 million for renewable energy projects and the ICO has financed green programs such as the Next Tech Fund
The ICO, for its part, has also launched projects that support sustainable investments. It has created the ‘ICO Sustainable Bonds’, which are aligned with compliance with the SDGs, and throughout its history it has financed Endesa, Iberdrola, Grupo Gonvarri, among others. It is also part of the large European fund, the Fond-ICO Next Tech, which in the case of Andromeda, an investment vehicle created by Seaya Ventures, it is intended to finance ‘green’ startups with 300 million. Within its pillars they say that the main objective of ICO is to promote economic activities that contribute to sustainable growth, job creation and wealth distribution.
In the case of Green Prado XI, ICO and Grupo BEI act as investors, and UCI is the one that issues the bonds. For this the joint venture will have to act as regulator of the project. Laporte comments that the new green projects are supervised, on the one hand, under the framework of the Green Bond framework de Sustainalytics, with a “list of eligible assets” and that must be published on its website annually. But the expert clarifies that, above all, quarterly The new projects that they audit should be reported to the actors to see “if they comply with the eligibility rules, reinforcing the quality of our future investments in sustainable credits and avoiding any ineligible ‘greenwashing’ in this project,” he says.
This reporting system, created by the credit company formed by Banco Santander and BNP Paribas, has been in operation since 2020 and for them it is “very robust and efficient”, which will allow them to correctly analyze the projects to be financed. Sustainalytics has also certified that the ‘A&B Bonds’ are in accordance with the Green Bond Principles (GBP) of the International Capital Market Association (ICMA). From now on, UCI has a period of five years, which is the duration of the bonds issued, to be able to make these 4,000 investments in both countries.