General Information
SOFID – Sociedade para o Financiamento do Desenvolvimento, Instituição Financeira de Crédito, SA was established on October 11, 2007 as a Development Finance Institution, with own resources of EUR 12.5 million. It is established as a limited liability company, but is majority-owned by the Portuguese State (59.99%). The remaining shareholders are the four major Portuguese banks: Banco Espirito Santo, Banco BPI, Caixa Geral de Depósitos, MillenniumBCP (10% each) - and ELO - Associação Portuguesa para o Desenvolvimento Económico e a Cooperação (“ELO - Portuguese Association for Economic Development and Cooperation”) (0.01%)). Its status allows SOFID to exercise diverse financial operations except the collection of deposits and reimbursable funds. The company joined EDFI (European Development Finance Institution) on February 1, 2008.

Instruments
SOFID's role is to offer the full spectrum of financial tools to foster investment and business in developing countries, and to contribute for the sustainable development of these countries. SOFID is mandated to focus especially on beneficiary countries of the Portuguese Official Development Assistance (ODA). SOFID's mission is to foster investment and business, and to support Portuguese companies which have investments or wish to invest in these countries, either alone or in partnerships which local investors.

SOFID offers long-term loans, guarantees and mezzanine finance, as well as equity participations, for investments in private companies. SOFID can offer financing for investments in start-ups, subsidiaries or joint ventures. It also provides guidance and consultancy in all phases of the projects for its customers. In addition, it will carry out loan programmes and facilities on behalf of the Portuguese government which support, for instance, pre-investment or investment-tied measures if they are for the benefit of the developing country and in line with the Portuguese strategy and guidelines for economic, cooperation and ODA policies.