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Lotte Pang
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E-mail: LPang@ifc.org

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Minakshi Seth
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Washington, D.C., June 18, 2009—IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, and Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ (BTMU) will provide a $60 million joint trade financing line to the Export-Import Bank of India (India Exim Bank) to help support export-focused small and medium enterprises, which have suffered reduced access to finance as a result of the global financial crisis.

The trade facility, shared equally by BTMU and IFC, will improve India Exim Bank’s ability to provide access to short-term trade funding for smaller businesses, enabling them to carry out export orders. The transaction follows the signing in May 2009 of a Memorandum of Cooperation between IFC and G-NEXID, an organization of emerging-market export credit agencies and development institutions focused on trade between developing countries. IFC and G-NEXID agreed to work to develop effective and sustainable financing solutions to assist importers and exporters in developing countries.

India Exim Bank is playing a significant role in providing competitive trade finance for the country’s export industry, with a special focus on small and medium enterprises, given their reduced access to foreign currency financing amid the ongoing global financial crisis.

“This important transaction with our longstanding partners, IFC and Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, will help us provide short-term foreign-currency trade finance,” said T.C. Venkat Subramanian, Chairman and Managing Director, India Exim Bank. “We hope it will also encourage other lenders to return to the Indian market and resume normal lending operations to Indian financial institutions.”

Lars Thunell, IFC Executive Vice President and CEO, said: “IFC’s support to the Export-Import Bank of India, in partnership with Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, reflects our commitment to provide targeted solutions for businesses in emerging markets and to address the contraction in trade financing during the global slowdown. This transaction represents an important step forward in our work with export credit agencies”.

Katsunori Nagayasu, President, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ said: “India Exim Bank and IFC are important partners for us. We hope to expand our relationship with both these institutions through similar transactions going forward. BTMU’s strategy is to strengthen its business in emerging markets, and India is an important market for us. This transaction reflects BTMU’s commitment to Indian market.”

The transaction follows the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between BTMU and IFC in October 2008 in which the two organizations agreed to work together to address the enormous need for private sector investment in emerging markets.

About IFC
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, creates opportunity for people to escape poverty and improve their lives. We foster sustainable economic growth in developing countries by supporting private sector development, mobilizing private capital, and providing advisory and risk mitigation services to businesses and governments. Our new investments totaled $16.2 billion in fiscal 2008, a 34 percent increase over the previous year. For more information, visit www.ifc.org.

About Export Import Bank of India (India Exim Bank)
India Exim Bank, set up under an Act of Parliament, is the leading financial institution engaged in financing, facilitating and promoting India’s International trade and investment. The Bank offers to Indian companies a comprehensive range of products and services. The Bank enjoys investment-grade rating on par with the Indian sovereign from four international agencies—Baa3 from Moody's, BBB- from Standard and Poor's and Fitch, and BBB+ from the Japan Credit Rating Agency. The Bank seeks to leverage its strong financials and sovereign rating to raise foreign-currency resources from international debt market through a variety of instruments and a diversified investor base, thereby enabling it to extend financial assistance to Indian exporting companies, including SMEs, at competitive rates.

About Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ (BTMU)
BTMU is the core member company of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, one of the world’s leading financial groups, with total assets of more than 198 trillion yen (about $2 trillion) as of March 31, 2009. The group’s services include commercial banking, trust banking, securities, credit cards, consumer finance, asset management and leasing. BTMU is Japan’s leading bank, with around 750 domestic branches and offices, more than 400,000 corporate customers, and about 40 million individual customers. It also has the largest overseas network of any Japanese bank, comprising about 450 offices and subsidiaries in more than 40 countries.