By Libby George
LONDON (Reuters) -The European Bank of Reconstruction and Development has extended the deadline for its shareholders to subscribe to a 2023 capital increase, the lender’s president said, and is in talks with its biggest contributor, the United States, on the issue.
Just over 60% of the EBRD’s 75 shareholders – including Japan and most EU 27 countries – were either in the process of or had already paid in for the capital increase that the lender’s board approved in late 2023, President Odile Renaud-Basso said in a news briefing on Monday.
Remaining ones – including the United States, which is the bank’s largest shareholder at 10% – now have more time to do so.
“The deadline will be extended until the end of the year,” said Renaud-Basso, speaking ahead of the EBRD’s annual general meeting that was scheduled to kick off in London on Tuesday.
“We always set a deadline to try to accelerate and then be ready to extend the deadline.”
The U.S. Treasury did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Washington’s financial support has become a key issue for multilateral development banks at a time when the administration under President Donald Trump has pivoted away from development finance.
Trump looks set to send $3.2 billion in contributions to the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA), which provides low- or zero-interest loans to the world’s poorest countries, fulfilling only part of the $4 billion pledge from his predecessor Joe Biden.
Renaud-Basso said that there would be more clarity on the U.S. contribution as the budget makes its way through Congress in the coming weeks, but that the bank was on a solid financial footing regardless.
“We had very good results, basically since 2023,” she said.
“In financial terms, this very, very solid ground and very, very strong position,” she said, adding if the U.S. did not subscribe it would remain the top shareholder but see its percentage of capital reduced compared with the other members.
Renaud-Basso said the EBRD would keep the green energy transition and a focus on expanding human capital – such as supporting women in business – among its top priorities despite the Trump administration’s stated objection to such priorities at other development banks.
“Our investment in this area is very much driven by the economics, the need for energy security, the need for the energy efficiency,” Renaud-Basso.
She said the bank’s board of governors was also expected to approve the start of EBRD operations in Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Benin as part of its expansion into Sub-Saharan Africa.
She added that global turmoil made support of banks like the EBRD more important than ever.
“The level of uncertainty has never been so high, with all the tensions around trade, major political tension, of course… Ukraine,” she said.
(Reporting By Libby George, additional reporting by Andrea Shalal, editing by Karin Strohecker and Alex Richardson)
