LAUSR

SMEs access to finance is facilitated through publicly supported guarantee arrangements for credit extended by banks to SMEs. The need for evaluating the performance of such arrangements has been recognised, but the results from an OECD/EC survey on actual evaluation practices suggest that there is considerable discrepancy in several countries between actual practices and what might be considered “good practices” in assessing the performance of these arrangements. Policy makers in these countries appear to trust in the net economic benefits of such interventions to such an extent that they do not feel obliged to produce robust “hard evidence” supporting this view.