Financing SMEs and Entrepreneurs 2026: Spain
Table of contents
According to the Survey on the Access to Finance of Enterprises in the Euro Area (SAFE), between 2023 and 2025 Spanish SMEs perceived an improvement in the availability of bank credit, in contrast to the situation in the euro area, where companies experienced a slight deterioration during the same period. However, the latest available data, corresponding to the fourth quarter of 2025, indicates that this improvement has been taking place at an increasingly slower pace. The SAFE also reports that, in the last two years, there has been a decrease in the loan rejection rate, dropping from 6.8% in 2023 to 3.6% in the fourth quarter of 2025. Credit demand, measured by loan applications, remained weak in both 2024 and 2025.
The increase of the ECB’s key interest rates raised the cost of new financing for non-financial corporations (NFCs), including SMEs1, between 2022 and 2023, although these cost increases tapered off in the second half of the latter year. In addition, the normalisation of ECB’s monetary policy that started in June 2024 led to a gradual decline in the interest rates on loans to SMEs. As a result, new lending to SMEs2 increased by 11.6% between 2022 and 2023 and by 16.1% between 2023 and 2024.
By contrast, mainly due to large repayments, outstanding SME loans decreased by 8.8% between 2022 and 2023 and by 1.9% between 2023 and 2024, reaching EUR 204 billion in the latter year. Total outstanding business loans declined by 4.7% between 2022 and 2023 but increased slightly by 0.4% in 2024, amounting to EUR 450 billion in the latter year. As a result, SME loans accounted for 45.3% of total loans to NFCs in 2024, 1.1 percentage points (p.p.) less than in 2023 and 3.2 p.p. less than in 2022.
The share of non-performing loans (NPLs) for productive activity (which includes loans to individual entrepreneurs) kept decreasing, and stood at 3.9% at the end of 2024, 0.21 p.p. lower than in December of 2023, and 0.36 p.p. lower than in 2022. This decline, which was maintained throughout 2025, is mainly explained by a fall in NPLs (the numerator).
The economic policy measures have been important in maintaining the repayment capacity of companies in a context of rising interest rates and global economic uncertainty. The credit guarantee programme “Response plan to Russia's war in Ukraine”, endowed with a maximum amount of EUR 10 billion, of which EUR 9 billion are directly managed by ICO3, has enabled banks to grant credit under advantageous conditions to companies (mainly SMEs) and self-employed, thereby reducing impairments. The Spanish government also approved the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan to receive the financial aid from the EU’s Mechanism for the Recovery and Resilience4, with a total financial envelope of EUR 163 billion (EUR 79 billion in direct grants and EUR 84 billion in loans) for the period 2021-2026. The plan, which has a detailed agenda of investment projects and reforms, hinges upon four pillars: green transition, digital transformation, social and territorial cohesion, and gender equality. Finally, in response to the tariff measures announced by the US Administration on April 2025, the Spanish Government rolled out the Trade Response and Relaunch Plan. With funds close to 0.9% of GDP, the plan has been designed to provide financing to firms that are more exposed or vulnerable to US tariff hikes. Specifically, it provides a credit guarantee facility through the ICO to boost the activity of firms hit by the tariffs and extends the coverage offered by the Spanish official export credit company (Compañía Española de Seguros de Crédito a la Exportación, CESCE) for export risks. The plan also redirects some pre-existing instruments (mainly loans associated with the Recovery and Resilience Facility) to provide financial support to those firms.
Regarding non-bank funding, the volume of venture capital investment in Spanish SMEs amounted to EUR 6.1 billion in 2024, which represented a 7.6% decline relative to the level reported in 2023 (EUR 6.6 billion), but was still well above the 2022 figure (EUR 5 billion).
Source: See Table 2.
In 2023, against the backdrop of a strong and fast monetary policy tightening, weak euro area growth and high uncertainty, the Spanish economy stood out as it recorded GDP growth of 2.5%, significantly above the euro area average of 0.4%. In 2024, GDP growth reached 3.2%, underpinned by the easing of monetary policy, strong private and government consumption, the positive contribution of net external demand, in particular, services exports, and the significant increase in employment and the labour force, largely driven by net migration flows. According to provisional estimates, in 2025 Spain’s GDP grew at a 2.8% in annual terms as a consequence of strong internal demand -especially private consumption and corporate investment- and despite the negative contribution of net external demand.
The rise in inflation, which had started in 2021, was intense and persistent both in the Euro Area and Spain. After reaching its maximum of 10.8% in July 2022, headline inflation in Spain started to decline progressively until reaching 2% in May 2025, its target rate, although rebounding during the second half of the year to stay at 2.9% in December 2025. Underlying inflation followed a similar trend, although slowed more gradually.
Regarding monetary policy, in July 2022 the ECB raised the interest rate on the deposit facility to 0% (from -0.50%, which was set in September 2019) and kept increasing it progressively until reaching 4% in September 2023. Hence, over this relatively short period, the deposit facility rate increased by 450 bp. The restrictive monetary policy stance led to a strong tightening of the financial conditions for Spanish companies during 2022 and the most part of 2023. The process started to reverse in June 2024, when the ECB began to progressively reduce the interest rate on the deposit facility until reaching its current level of 2% in June 2025. The other key interest rates on the Eurosystem’s main refinancing operations and the marginal lending facility followed a similar evolution.
According to the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE), 99.9% of all firms, both NFCs and sole proprietorships, were SMEs5 on January 1st, 2025. Of these, 55% were firms with no employees, 40.4% were micro firms with at least one employee, 3.9% small enterprises and 0.6% medium-sized enterprises. According to the breakdown by legal form, NFCs accounted for 41.2% of all firms and sole proprietorships for the remaining 58.8%.6
The increase of the ECB’s key interest rates raised the cost of new financing for firms in 2023, although these cost increases tapered off in the second half of the year and had a limited impact on firms’ vulnerability and the credit quality of banks’ balance sheets. In addition, the normalisation of ECB’s monetary policy that started in June 2024 led to a gradual improvement in financing conditions and a steady recovery in the demand for credit. During the first half of 2025, as the ECB continued lowering its key interest rates, the cost of bank financing for firms kept declining, their access to bank credit improved slightly, and their demand for loans continued rising, although it remained weak. As a result, bank financing to firms grew. However, lower funding costs and the improvement in the macroeconomic environment led to lower leverage ratios (aggregate debt-to-asset ratio of 42.1% in 2024, from 44.6% in 2023) and debt service burden, implying that firms’ vulnerability stayed at low levels from a historical perspective and stage 2 and stage 3 bank loans kept decreasing.
Thanks to the easing in financial conditions since the beginning of 2024, the volume of new loans to all NFCs grew by 15.9% between 2023 and 2024, after experiencing a small decline between 2022 and 2023 (3.3%). As a result, the volume reached EUR 402 billion in 2024, a figure also greater than the one recorded in 2022, EUR 359 billion. New lending to SMEs (proxied by loans up to EUR 1 million to NFCs) followed a similar trend, increasing by 16.1% between 2023 and 2024, after growing by 11.6% between 2022 and 2023, reaching EUR 224 billion in 2024. These developments led to an increase in the share of new lending to SMEs up to 55.7% in 2024 (0.1 p.p. and 7.5 p.p. more than in 2023 and 2022, respectively).
Regarding outstanding balances, total loans to NFCs increased slightly (by 0.4%) between 2023 and 2024, after a substantial decline (by 4.3%) between 2022 and 2023, standing at EUR 450 billion in 2024, a figure still lower than the one registered in 2022 (EUR 470 billion). This evolution is consistent with that of the ECB’s monetary policy stance, as the period between July 2022 and September 2023 corresponded to the strongest and fastest monetary policy tightening ever seen in the euro area; by contrast, between June 2024 and June 2025 the ECB has progressively eased its monetary policy. In the case of SMEs, outstanding loans followed a downward trend between 2022 and 2024. They decreased modestly by 1.9% between 2023 and 2024, after a significant decline of 8.8% between 2022 and 2023, standing at EUR 204 billion in 2024. These developments led to a smaller share of SMEs loans in total outstanding loans to NFCs in 2024 (45.3%) than the values registered in 2023 and 2022 (46.4% and 48.5%, respectively).
Regarding the maturity of bank credit, short-term outstanding loans to SMEs declined substantially, by 12.3%, between 2023 and 2024, after a large increase of 31.1% between 2022 and 2023. This translated into a slight rise of the share of short-term loans in all loans to SMEs (93.9% in 2024, as compared to 93.6% in 2022). While a higher ratio of short-term loans always makes SMEs more vulnerable to refinancing risks, these are quite limited in the current context because of the downward trend of new lending costs and a less restrictive credit supply.
The process of reduction of NPLs that began in 2013 has continued in the last years. The share of NPLs, proxied by the ratio of doubtful loans to finance the productive activity of the NFCs and individual entrepreneurs, decreased by 0.15 p.p. between 2022 and 2023 despite the strong monetary policy tightening during most of that period and by 0.21 p.p. between 2023 and 2024 (fostered by the easing of monetary policy since the second half of 2024). As a result, it stood at 3.9% at the end of 2024, which was the lowest value since the start of the global financial crisis in 2008 (3.7%).This decline, which was maintained throughout 2025, is mainly explained by a fall in NPLs (numerator). This evolution is caused by the decrease in the interest rates of loans and the robust growth of the Spanish economy (3.5% in 2024 and 2.8% in 2025 in annual terms, as measured by the GDP).
Also consistent with the evolution of the ECB’s monetary policy stance, the average interest rate on loans to SMEs (proxied by loans up to EUR 1 million to NFCs) increased substantially, from 3.4% to 5.3%, between 2022 and 2023. However, it dropped from 5.3% to 4.1% between 2023 and 2024. Similarly, the average interest rate on loans to large firms (proxied by loans greater than EUR1 million to NFCs) rose significantly between 2022 and 2023 (from 3.2% to 5%), but declined between 2023 and 2024 (from 5% to 4%). Accordingly, the average interest rate spread between loans to SMEs and large corporations widened slightly between 2022 and 2023 (from 20 bp. to 23 bp.), while it narrowed substantially between 2023 and 2024 (from 23 bp. to 4 bp.).
In this context, the percentage of SMEs that applied for bank credit declined substantially between 2022 and 2023 (from 21.9% to 18.3%), but bounced back in 2024, standing at 20.2%. Although this is 1.9 p.p. lower than the value observed in 2021, before the ECB tightened its monetary policy. The loan rejection rate dropped (by 2.7 p.p., down to 9.5%) between 2022 and 2023, arguably because the higher interest rates deterred firms with low creditworthiness from applying for credit, while between 2023 and 2024 it increased slightly (by 0.4 pp., up to 9.9%), in parallel to lower credit costs.
According to the ECB’s Bank Lending Survey (BLS), credit standards in Spain remained stable in both 2024 and 2025. During the same period, the euro area as a whole continued to exhibit a moderate tightening of credit standards, although much milder than that recorded during 2022 and 2023. In Spain, banks’ overall conditions for new loans eased from the second half of 2024 onwards, in a context of progressively declining interest rates and narrowing margins, following the period of rate increases experienced during the previous two years. The BLS also shows that demand for bank credit by SMEs began to grow in 2024. In 2025, demand continued to rise slightly, although the latest available information, corresponding to the fourth quarter of 2025, reveals a moderate drop in loan applications, in a context of macroeconomic uncertainty that appears to have negatively affected companies’ investment decisions.
Regarding government assistance to companies, most of the policy support, which surged during the pandemic, continued to be phased out in 2023 and 2024. Direct government loans to SMEs decreased by 9.2% between 2022 and 2023 and by 6% between 2023 and 2024, amounting to EUR 20.8 billion in the latter year. This amount is significantly lower than the level of direct government loans observed before the Covid-19 crisis (EUR 32.7 billion in 2019).
The volume of venture capital investment in Spanish SMEs (defined as firms with less than 250 employees) amounted to EUR 6.1 billion in 2024, which implied a 7.6% drop relative to the level reported in 2023 (EUR 6.6 billion), but was still well above the 2022 figure (EUR 5 billion).
The number of bankruptcy filings by NFCs stood at 4,963 in 2023 and increased to 5,589 in 2024 and to 5,871 in 2025, still below the 2022 figure (6,080 insolvency proceedings), when the number of bankruptcy filings rose substantially because of the end of the insolvency moratorium on June 30 and the entry into force of the reform of the Spanish Insolvency Law on September 26. The insolvency moratorium was implemented to avoid the liquidation of viable businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic7, while the reform of the Insolvency Law made the fresh start regime more appealing to sole proprietors and owners of small, incorporated firms that had pledged personal guarantees or their own assets as collateral to obtain bank funding for their businesses. The growth of insolvency proceedings during the last two years is mainly explained by the new insolvency procedure for micro firms, faster and less costly than the ordinary one, which has been increasingly used since its entry into force on January 1, 2023, and it currently accounts for nearly 22% of the total bankruptcy filings by NFCs.
In 2022 the Spanish Government established the credit guarantee programme “Response plan to Russia’s war in Ukraine”, endowed with a maximum amount of EUR 10 billion, of which EUR 9 billion are directly managed by ICO. The aim of this credit line is to guarantee the principal of new loans and other financing instruments granted by credit institutions to firms and self-employed from all productive sectors (except for financial and insurance services) that were adversely affected by the economic effects of the war in Ukraine, such as rising energy prices, raw materials, or electricity. The guaranteed financing must be used to address the liquidity needs of companies and self-employed (current expenses, working capital, and investments). Three tranches of the credit line were activated, two in 2022 and one in 2023. The first one, endowed with EUR 5 billion, aimed to guarantee credit granted to SMEs and self-employed (EUR 3.5 billion) and to larger firms (EUR 1.5 billion), while the recipients of the second one, endowed with EUR 0.5 billion, were gas-intensive companies. The third one, which amounted to EUR 3.5 billion, guaranteed loans provided to SMEs and self-employed (EUR 3 billion) and to larger firms (EUR 0.5 billion). The programme remained active between June 1st and December 31st, 2024, exclusively for firms from the primary sector, and it was completely finalised at the end of that year.
The Spanish Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (RTRP) is the second largest (in absolute figures) financed by the Next Generation EU (NGEU) programme and its main spending tool, the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF). The plan, which has a detailed agenda of investment projects and structural reforms to promote growth and business and job creation, hinges upon four pillars: green transition, digital transformation, social and territorial cohesion, and gender equality. The first phase of the RTRP envisioned a total investment of up to EUR140 billion, expanded to EUR163 billion (EUR 79.8 billion in direct grants and EUR 83.2 billion in loans) in the 2021-2026 period following the October 2023 amendment, which represents more than 12% of Spain’s GDP. A specific part of the plan, called Component 13: Supporting SMEs, and endowed with EUR 87.6 billion, focuses on the transformation and resilience of Spanish SMEs. The grant part includes the June 2022 upward revision of Spain’s grant allocation of EUR 7.7 billion and the country’s REPowerEU grant allocation of EUR 2.6 billion. In addition, Spain has requested a transfer of its share from the Brexit Adjustment Reserve of EUR 58 million to its RTRP. So far, EUR 48.3 billion of the RRF resources (29.6 % of the amended RTRP) have been received. These have been disbursed by the European Commission in the form of pre-financing and four grant instalments. The amended plan focuses on the green transition, devoting almost 40 % of the resources to it, and fosters the digital transformation by committing 25.9 % of the funds (excluding REPowerEU) to digital projects. Disbursement by the European Commission of the remaining funds is contingent on fulfilling various milestones and targets, associated with investment projects and structural reforms, by 31 August 2026. These funds, combined with the EUR 36.7 billion of the Structural Funds of the multiannual financial framework 2021-2027, present a unique opportunity to boost Spain’s potential growth capacity.
In the current context of trade uncertainty due to the tariffs that the US Administration may impose on imports from the EU, on 8 April 2025 the Spanish government approved a package of measures to mitigate the negative impact of those policies on Spanish companies.8 The package includes a line of credit guarantees worth EUR 5 billion through the ICO to ensure the financing of both exporter and importer companies affected by the change in US tariff policy and to support possible industrial restructuring processes. It also reinforces the Corporate Internationalisation Fund (FIEM), increasing its budget to EUR 700 million, to enable companies to boost their international presence and diversify their exports to reduce risk. In addition, the coverage offered by the Compañía Española de Seguros de Crédito a la Exportación (CESCE), the Spanish export credit agency, to companies has been extended, with an increase in the maximum coverage limit from EUR 9 billion to EUR 15 billion, which will allow for the immediate mobilisation of EUR 2 billion in coverage for international projects affected by new tariffs.
In September 2025, the ICO launched ICO Crecimiento, a new 100% digital direct financing tool aimed at viable SMEs with high growth potential and job creation capacity which, due to their specific characteristics (innovative sectors, strong investment in intangible assets, high but sustainable leverage ratios), face particularly severe barriers to external financing and have not been served by traditional financial channels. Endowed with EUR 1 billion, this instrument seeks to complement the private sector and address market failures through an agile, automated process with personalised support, providing loans at very favourable conditions (maturity between 5 and 10 years, grace periods, low interest rates9) to finance both investment projects and liquidity needs associated with the company’s activities.
Centro para el Desarrollo Tecnológico Industrial (CDTI, by its Spanish acronym) is a public enterprise that depends on the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities and promotes the development and technological innovation of Spanish firms, mainly SMEs. For that purpose, it provides advice and financial support to foster the implementation of their R&D&I projects. The main financial instrument used by the CDTI is partly refundable aid (long-term soft loans in which up to 33% of the amount is not required to be paid back), followed by grants, venture capital, and pre-commercial public procurement. In 2023, CDTI evaluated a total of 3,096 R&D&I project proposals, supporting 1,183 R&D&I projects with a total commitment of EUR 839.7 million, mobilising a total R&D budget of EUR 1,151.9 million.
Compañía Española de Financiación del Desarrollo (COFIDES, by its Spanish acronym) is a state-owned enterprise specialised in the management of State funds (Secretariat of State for Trade, attached to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Enterprise) that provides medium and long-term financing for private investments linked to different public policy purposes such as supporting the internationalisation of Spanish companies and, since 2021, strengthening the solvency of Spanish companies severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2023 the total portfolio committed to investments reached EUR 2 billion.
Empresa Nacional de Innovación, SA (ENISA, by its Spanish acronym), an enterprise that is majority-owned by the Spanish State, primarily offers financing for SME projects where innovation is crucial, mainly through participating loans. In 2023, it received 1,740 loan applications, of which 643 were approved, amounting to EUR 112.3 million, which represents a 6.4% increase with respect to 2022.
Mutual guarantee schemes (MGSs), which are financial institutions with mixed capital (provided by regional governments, credit institutions and SMEs themselves), grant guarantees that cover, at least partially, the losses in lending transactions in case of default by the borrower. They have a marked regional and sectorial scope, and their activity is usually linked to a region. In 2024, they granted guarantees amounting to EUR 2.7 billion, a 5% increase from 2023. A significant part of the risk assumed by MGSs is usually transferred to Compañía Española de Reafianzamiento, SA (CERSA, by its Spanish acronym).
In insurance, Compañía Española de Seguros de Crédito a la Exportación (CESCE, by its Spanish acronym) manages export credit risk on behalf of the State, with the majority of its capital publicly owned. The volume of export credit direct insurance policies reached EUR 178.7 million in 2024, which represents an increase of 2% from the previous year, while the volume of export credit reinsurance reached EUR 17.9 million in 2024, implying a decline of 1% from 2023.
The new special procedure for micro firms (procedimiento especial para microempresas), which entered into force on January 1st, 2023, has experienced a substantial increase, from very low initial levels (15 proceedings in Q1 2023) to higher -although still relatively low- levels (511 proceedings in Q4 2025). This suggests that it may take some time for economic agents to learn and trust a very different bankruptcy proceeding. Micro firms are defined as those firms –either NFCs or sole proprietorships- with less than 10 full-time employees and an annual turnover lower than EUR 750,000 or total liabilities lower than EUR 350,000 in the year before the bankruptcy filing.
The special procedure for micro firms is a fast-track simplified bankruptcy proceeding, with less court involvement, which is expected to be much cheaper and faster than the general proceeding (concurso de acreedores).10 The special procedure for micro firms attempts to reduce costs and save judicial resources by not requiring an insolvency administrator in most cases and by only requiring the intervention of the judge regarding the most relevant decisions of the proceeding or when there is a conflict between the parties that must be resolved by the court. Instead, the procedure relies on online systems and information technologies. In particular, the communication between the parties during the procedure takes place by means of online free formularies and the parties also have access to an online free payment simulator, which is expected to reduce the costs incurred by the debtor when paying for professional advice. The participation of professionals (insolvency administrator, attorney, restructuring expert, mediator, etc.) is only required in some circumstances (for instance, the debtor must receive the advice of an attorney if the bankruptcy may be ruled as “guilty”11).12 Otherwise, if the debtor or their creditors demand them, they must pay for their services. In addition, in order to reduce transaction costs, liquidations are carried out by means of an online liquidation platform, of free and universal access, which contains all the assets of micro firms that are undergoing liquidation. The liquidation of the assets is carried out by two means: (i) the direct sale of those assets, via external access to the catalogue; (ii) the implementation of periodic online auctions.
Source: See Table 2
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← 1. Unless stated otherwise, throughout this report the definition of SMEs excludes sole proprietorships.
← 2. Proxied by loans up to EUR 1 million to NFCs.
← 3. ICO (Instituto de Crédito Oficial) is Spain’s main public bank.
← 4. The two main instruments of the Next Generation EU (NGEU) programme are the Mechanism for the Recovery and Resilience and the Fund REACT-EU.
← 5. Following the Commission Recommendation of 6 May 2003 concerning the definition of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, but only according to the number of employees because of data limitations.
← 6. For the computation of all these figures, associations and autonomous agencies have been excluded because they are non-profit entities.
← 7. Against the backdrop of the economic crisis triggered by the Covid-19, in April 2020 the Spanish Government approved an insolvency moratorium for all debtors, firms and individuals. Specifically, it suspended until 31 December 2020 the requirement that debtors must file for insolvency, i.e., voluntary filing (concurso voluntario) and it prevented their creditors from initiating filings (concurso necesario) before that date. The moratorium was extended several times until 30 June 2022.
← 8. Royal Decree-Law 4/2025, of April 8, on urgent measures to respond to the tariff threat and to relaunch trade.
← 9. The interest rate is set at the Euribor plus a spread that ranges between 0.75% and 1.75%, depending on the risk of the operation.
← 10. Micro firms cannot use neither the general proceeding nor the so-called “restructuring plans”, which are pre-insolvency procedures to deal with financial distress at an earlier stage. Micro firms that are sole proprietorships can also use the fresh start procedure.
← 11. A bankruptcy proceeding can be declared as “fortuitous” (concurso fortuito) or “guilty” (concurso culpable). A guilty ruling implies, among other penalties, that the management is held personally liable for the debts of the firm that remain unpaid after its assets have been liquidated.
← 12. However, the individuals that prove their lack of resources have the right to receive free legal assistance, provided by the State.