Poland sees EBRD investment exceeding EUR 1.4 bln again in 2025 - Moraru (interview)

"After a record-breaking 2024, we expect our involvement in Poland to remain at an equally solid level this year, in line with the bank's strategy for Poland approved last year, which is valid until 2029," Andrea Moraru told an interview with PAP Biznes.

She added that Poland remains a priority market for the EBRD. A few weeks ago, the bank's First Vice-President Greg Guyett emphasised during a visit to Warsaw that Poland is important because of its size, resilience and the role it plays in the integration of the region.

"So far, we have invested around EUR 1.2 billion in 39 projects in 2025, 70 percent of which are in line with our green economy transition goals. We expect to end this year at roughly the same level as in 2024," Moraru stressed.

In 2024, the EBRD invested a record EUR 1.43 billion in Poland, which was among the five countries with the highest investments by the bank.

"In terms of investment areas, they are very diverse in terms of sectors. Of course, we continue to support the development of capital markets through various financial instruments, but also the energy, manufacturing and supply chain sectors," said the EBRD regional director.

Among the key projects, she mentioned EUR 200 million in support for the Baltica 2 offshore wind farm, implemented jointly by the special purpose vehicle of Polish listed power utility PGE and the Danish Ørsted, the largest offshore project in Poland, which reduces dependence on coal and CO2 emissions by 3.5 million tonnes per year.

"This is one of the most important projects we have supported this year in terms of green transition. However, for us, this transition goes beyond the energy sector itself," Moraru said.

"In this context, another interesting example of our involvement is the housing sector and a project implemented in cooperation with [listed lender - MI ed.] BNP Paribas and InvestEU, in which we provided a guarantee of EUR 80 million, enabling the raising of EUR 100 million to improve the energy efficiency of residential buildings," she added.

The project involved the installation of PV panels, insulation of buildings and the installation of heat pumps.

At the beginning of June 2025, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development announced that it has lent EUR 25 million to Resi4Rent to support the expansion of the company's rental housing platform across Poland.

"Resi4Rent is another project that will be supported for many years to come. It is a platform where, through various investments, we have launched a total of over EUR 100 million to expand the base of sustainable rental housing with a target of 10,000 flats by 2026," Moraru told PAP Biznes.

As the EBRD's regional director for Poland and other CEE countries pointed out, from the capital market perspective, the bank played a significant role in bank issues.

"We supported many MREL issues by Polish banks, as well as covered bonds. In the corporate sector, we cooperate with [listed convenience store chain - MI ed.] Zabka – we supported their first issue of sustainable bonds, worth PLN 1 billion," Moraru emphasised.

In the area of equity investment, she pointed to, among other things, a USD 44 million investment in the robotics company Nomagic as part of a venture capital financing round, while in total, the EBRD has invested approximately EUR 200 million in Poland this year through equity funds and direct equity investments.

"When it comes to direct equity investments, we have co-invested several times with private equity funds. We recently finalised an investment in a fintech company called ProService. Overall, Poland is a kind of sandbox for innovation for us, where we test scalable solutions that we then implement in other countries, because Poland is such a developed market and the companies here are quite sophisticated," Moraru stressed.

By the end of the year, the EBRD intends to complete several more investments in Poland: in capital market development, bond issues, and equity investments: directly and in venture capital funds.

When asked whether Polish companies could benefit from the development of the renewable energy market in Ukraine, Moraru replied that for the time being, Poland itself has significant energy needs to meet.

"This explains the large number of renewable energy investments in Poland alone, but I am convinced that there are opportunities for exporting surplus energy in the future and for expansion in Ukraine in general, as well as in other countries in the region. Already today, there are many Polish companies in the Baltic states," the EBRD regional director noted.

She emphasised that the needs for reconstruction in Ukraine will be enormous, and the EBRD has already invested EUR 8.5 billion there since the beginning of the war.

Referring to the prospects for the Polish economy, Moraru replied that the bank sees them as quite positive.

"We are pleased with the growth, which is forecast at 3.4 percent in 2025. The drivers of this growth are public investments under the national recovery plan KPO, falling inflation, and rising consumption and wages," she assessed.

"Poland is a strong economy, currently the 20th largest in the world. However, there are certain challenges: investment remains volatile and its share in GDP is still quite low compared to the European average," she added.

She also pointed to the environment of persistently high interest rates, low equity investments, a relatively underdeveloped capital market and the expected trade imbalance due to customs duties.

"This will indirectly affect Poland through weaker demand in Germany. On the fiscal side, the budget deficit is quite high, at around 6.9 percent of GDP. Much of this is driven by defence spending, but this is a necessary cost related to national security," EBRD's Moraru assessed.

"From an investment perspective, we see Poland as resilient. Over the last 6-9 months, we have seen a slight improvement in investors' perception of Poland," she added.

Andrea Moraru told PAP Biznes that investors had previously felt less comfortable looking at Poland through the prism of its proximity to Ukraine, but the strong fundamentals of the economy had contributed to an improvement in sentiment.

When asked about the prospects for EBRD investment in the private sector in Poland next year, she replied that unless something "dramatic" happens, she does not expect any major changes.

jz/ ao/ nl/