The International Finance Corporation (IFC) said it is lending 387 million euro ($424.3 million) to NE Property B.V. (NEPC), a subsidiary of Dutch-registered shopping centre developer NEPI Rockcastle, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and boost energy efficiency in the commercial buildings sector of Romania and Bulgaria. The senior unsecured financing package is structured as a green loan with sustainability-linked elements, which is the first loan of this kind for NEPI Rockcastle (NEPIRC), IFC - the World Bank's investment arm - said in a press release in late December. IFC is providing a 225 million senior loan from its own account, which is complemented by a syndicated senior loan of 115 million euro under IFC's B Loan programme and a senior loan of around 47 million euro under the Managed Co-Lending Portfolio Program. The financing will help NEPIRC, which is a major owner and operator of shopping centres in Central and Eastern Europe, to fund the decarbonisation of commercial buildings and advance a pipeline of energy efficient development projects. Underdeveloped infrastructure and a lack of modern energy-saving amenities make the buildings sector a major contributor to high greenhouse emissions in Bulgaria and Romania. In Bulgaria and Romania, buildings account for about 45% and 35% of national energy consumption, respectively. The supply of new, more green retail building stock has been slowed in both countries by the uncertain economic climate, rising interest rates and higher construction costs, IFC said. "IFC's loan enables NEPIRC to advance its development pipeline of modern, commercial retail assets that are expected to be more energy efficient than local benchmarks," Ary Naim, IFC's regional manager for Central and South Europe, said. Euronext-listed NEPIRC owns over 2 million square metres of retail real estate in Romania, Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Serbia and Lithuania. The company runs more than 50 shopping centres and employs over 600 staff. Bulgaria and Romania make up 44% of the value of the company's property portfolio, according to its website. Most recently, NEPIRC opened a shopping centre in the southwestern Romanian city of Craiova. In Romania, it owns shopping centres also in Bucharest, Braila, Constanta, Ploiesti, Sibiu, Timisoara and other cities. In Bulgaria, the group owns the Serdika and Paradise Center shopping malls in Sofia.
Romanian car rental company Klass Wagen said that it launched the Autozentrum brand and opened its first subsidiary in Germany, becoming the first Romanian company to sell used cars on the German market. The move marks the beginning of the Klass Wagen Autozentrum European network, through which the group intends to sell used cars directly […]
The Romanian men's tennis team defeated El Salvador 3-1 over the weekend of September 13-14 and secured a spot in the Davis Cup World Group I Play-offs. The tie between the two teams was played within World Group II. In the first match of the tie, Romanian Radu Țurcanu defeated Marcelo Arévalo, 6-7 (3/7), 6-3, […]
France has introduced a pilot program to teach Romanian as a mandatory foreign language in its public school system, marking the first such initiative in the country’s education sector, the Romanian Embassy in Paris announced. The project began at Collège Aimé et Eugénie Cotton in Blanc-Mesnil, a town in the Seine-Saint-Denis department, where many students […]
Romanian athlete Sabrina Maneca Voinea won the gold medal in the final floor exercise at the 2025 FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Challenge Cup held in Paris. Voinea, who had also had the highest score in qualifications, namely 13.633, received 13.800 points for her final routine, earning the top spot. The silver medal went to the […]
An expected decision on prolonging the price capping mechanism for staple food, which expires at the end of September, may generate more tensions within Romania's four-party coalition. The Social Democrats (PSD) expressed firm views over the weekend, after the government's spokesperson, Ioana Dogioiu, on September 13 claimed that the non-prolongation decision was approved by all […]
Romania's Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian ambassador for the second time in only a couple of days, after a Russian drone entered the national territory in the evening of September 13. In a mission described by Romanian defence minister Ionut Mosteanu as "most likely a provocation," the Russian drone followed a circular trajectory for 50 […]
