In 2003, the Mexican Foreign Trade Bank (Bancomext) expects to channel resources of US$8.2bn to companies, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs)
Bancomext registered a 27% year-on-year increase in the amount of money loaned to companies during 2002, rising from US$5.5bn to US$6.99bn.
The Bancomext Board said that thanks to the greater dynamism in services for exporting companies, especially SMEs and suppliers of final exporters, Bancomext surpassed its financing program established for 2002 by 17%.
The bank's funding helped support 1,866 companies, of which 97% were SMEs that started operating or were consolidating their positions in the international markets.
Of total financing, US$5.44bn was granted in different forms of credit since direct exporters were granted US$5.04bn for working capital and investment. Some US$398m was loaned to indirect exporters to strengthen the productive export chain.
