New companies benefit from Jordanian initiative to guarantee funds

Banks in Jordan banks have participated in a nationwide initiative to guarantee funds for start-up companies have revealed that 181 new firms have benefited from the scheme so far this year, Al-Sabeel reported on Monday.

In a written press statement, the Jordanian Company to Guarantee Loans said that 119 applications have been processed and 65 others are still being looked at. This compares favourably with the 44 companies which benefited from the initiative in the first half of last year.

The bank stressed that work on the programme speeded up during the second quarter of this year after the Central Bank gave 50 million Jordanian dinars as additional funding for the initiative. This allowed participating companies to raise the threshold of their guarantees from 100,000 to 250,000 dinars.

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The Central Bank created the initiative in cooperation with other banks in the Kingdom in order to guarantee funding for start-up projects in 2016. It came into effect at the beginning of 2017. Increasing demand for this kind of finance was the main reason for the Central Bank to give additional funds for the programme.