Dutch development bank FMO is considering a four-year loan of up to $75 million to Azerbaijan’s AccessBank to support lending to micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, including women, youth and agriculture borrowers, according to documents seen by DevFiNews.
The proposed multi-currency facility will comprise a committed tranche of $40 million and an uncommitted tranche of $35 million, according to FMO disclosure documents.
The loan will allow AccessBank to raise funding in both Azerbaijani manat and US dollars, giving the lender medium-term capital to expand its loan book and improve its balance sheet structure.
AccessBank is a mid-sized Azerbaijani bank focused on MSME and retail customers. It has around 1,700 employees, 39 branches, total assets of about $1 billion and capital of roughly $138 million.
The bank has been an FMO client since 2007, making the proposed loan part of a long-running relationship between the Dutch development finance institution and one of Azerbaijan’s specialist MSME lenders.
FMO said the full amount of the facility will be used to finance microentrepreneurs and SMEs, with a focus on women, youth and agriculture borrowers. The investment is aimed at expanding access to finance for smaller businesses, which often face tighter credit conditions than larger corporates in frontier and emerging markets.
The deal also gives AccessBank access to longer-tenor funding at a time when development finance institutions are using partner banks to channel capital into underserved segments of the economy.
The project has been classified as Category C under FMO’s sustainability framework, meaning it is expected to have minimal or no adverse environmental and social risks. AccessBank will be required to apply the EDFI Exclusion List as well as local environmental and social laws and regulations.