Guarantee bank
Guarantee banks are privately organized development banks supported by the state with the aim of supporting commercial companies and professions with loan or equity financing. The guarantees they provide are full security for all credit institutions . Guarantee banks receive from the federal and provincial counter-guarantees and thus awarded public guarantees .
background
Guarantee banks are special banks that do not offer all banking business as a universal bank , but are nevertheless credit institutions according to Section 1 of the German Banking Act , since the commercial assumption of guarantees ( bank guarantees ) requires normal banking operations. Guarantee banks refer to themselves as private self-help institutions of the middle class , in which chambers of crafts, chambers of industry and commerce, chambers of the liberal professions, business associations and guilds, banks and savings banks as well as insurance companies are involved. They are not public and are not in competition with each other, but are - each legally and economically independent - work for medium-sized businesses in the respective federal state. The guarantee banks are therefore not state-owned, but private funding institutes - however, the federal government and the respective state support the funding activities in a variety of ways. In addition to guarantees from guarantee banks, there are other public guarantees from the federal and state governments.
history
Guarantee banks were founded after the Second World War, the first in Schleswig-Holstein in 1949. The cause was the post-war economic situation, in which companies and potential entrepreneurs often had neither cash nor assets that could be used as collateral due to the consequences of the war. In order to still enable economically viable projects, the guarantee banks were founded in the federal states - often still under the name of the state guarantee fund or loan guarantee association - which, with the support of credit institutions, business associations, chambers, guilds and, last but not least, the state, were able to provide loan collateral and thus the economic upturn supported in Germany. Guarantee banks were also established in the new federal states after reunification. In addition, many Eastern European countries have adopted the guarantee banking system as part of the EU's eastward expansion . The use of guarantee banks to enable company growth or business start-ups was repeatedly strengthened in the past against the background of the search for effective economic development instruments (here in the form of budget-friendly contingent liabilities).
functionality
The lending business is basically divided into " refinancing " and " credit risk ". Both functions deal either with the procurement of the funds to be lent (refinancing) or with the assumption of risk if the borrower cannot repay the loan. The task of the guarantee banks is solely to assume credit risks of up to 80% by means of default guarantees , which generally secure loans of up to EUR 1.56 million. This significantly reduces the risk of the financing bank. The guarantee bank only pays the credit institution if the customer can no longer meet his credit obligations and other collateral has been realized. However, a default payment by the guarantee bank to the credit institution does not release the borrower from his payment obligations; rather, the debt relationship is automatically transferred to the guarantee bank (see also Section 774 (1) sentence 1 BGB). Guarantee banks in turn receive proportional support from the federal and state governments for the payments to be made: 65% of the guarantees in the old federal states and in the new federal states have been re-guaranteed by the federal government and the respective state at 75% since 2013 (previously 80%).
Guarantee banks in the federal states
In every federal state there are legally independent guarantee banks (e.g. the Bürgschaftsbank Hessen, Bürgschaftsbank Schleswig-Holstein, Bürgschaftsbank Sachsen-Anhalt or Bürgschaftsbank NRW), whose promotional activities hardly differ. All guarantee banks offer default guarantees with which they relieve the house banks of up to 80% of the credit risk. Most of them also offer “bank guarantees”. With the special program, entrepreneurs can first contact the Guarantee Bank directly with their plans. With the basic guarantee commitment, the entrepreneur looks for a house bank to finance the loan. This makes the search for a house bank easier. The guarantee banks have been offering agricultural guarantees since October 2015. The nationwide program supports agricultural businesses, aquaculture businesses and non-commercial horticultural businesses. The guarantee banks have been financing energy-saving contracting projects with contracting guarantees since 2016. For this purpose, a new model contract was developed with experts from energy agencies and trades.
The guarantee banks are part of the Association of German Guarantee Banks .
literature
Books
- Dirk Kramer: Guarantee banks as an instrument to overcome credit rationing in Germany? An empirical study in the states of Brandenburg and Berlin. Ibidem-Verlag, Stuttgart 2008.
- Axel G. Schmidt, Marco van Elkan: The macroeconomic benefit of the German guarantee banks. Lit Verlag, Berlin 2006.
- R. Flessa: guarantees of the state and the loan guarantee associations. Legal bases, explained for credit institutions, licensing authorities, borrowers and their advisors. Fritz Knapp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1999.
Essays
- Association Européenne du Cautionnement Mutuel: Guaranteeing loans for small and medium-sized enterprises. Sharing credit risk, an incentive for investment and growth ... The guarantee schemes members of the European Mutual Guarantee Association. Presentation and comparison. 2006
- J. Bigus, T. Langer, D. Schiereck: Why are there guarantees? In: Credit and Capital . 4, 2005.
- H.-G. Geis: Loan guarantee associations in development cooperation. Brief report on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation. Free University of Berlin. Institute for Banking and Finance, Berlin 1993. (Reports and materials No. 15)
- L. Kokalj, G. Paffenholz, P. Moog: New trends in SME financing . (Vol. 99). (I. f. Mittelstandsforschung, Ed.) Deutscher Universitäts-Verlag, Wiesbaden 2003.
- M. Stefanović: How the guarantee banking system works and what it means for SME financing in Germany. Banks, Performance and Financial Markets. Fritz Knapp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009.
- Alex G. Schmidt, Marco van Elkan: General economic benefits of the German guarantee banks. Institute for Medium-Sized Business Economics at the University of Trier, 2010.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ inexweb GmbH: Agricultural Guarantee | Home. In: www.agrar-buergschaft.de. Retrieved October 27, 2016 .
- ^ Contracting guarantees - Association of German Guarantee Banks eV In: www.contracting-buergschaft.de. Retrieved October 27, 2016 .
- ↑ Press releases - Association of German Guarantee Banks eV In: www.vdb-info.de. Retrieved October 27, 2016 .