PRESS RELEASE

BANCA CARIGE ON THE SIDE OF BUSINESSES FOR THE NRRP

FIRST FOCUS: TOURISM

The strategic partnership with Cerved will make available to businesses a specific tool and a

specialised Team to help them to access the funds allocated by the NRRP.

Genoa, 3 December 2021. The Carige Group continues the path outlined by "Futuro Liguria", the project starting from the survey carried out in May 2021 on Ligurian businesses customers of the Bank to analytically examine their positioning and their needs with regard to the necessary investments needed to increase their level of competitiveness.

The survey has been conducted considering the necessary strategic levers for a future that is already a reality: green transition, digital transformation, innovation, sustainability, market study and investing in human capital. The final goal is creating a network of advisory support, even through qualified partnerships with specialised companies, made available to entrepreneurs in order to competitively qualify their investments and, thus, to seize the financing opportunities provided by the Bank.

In today's socio-economic context of enhanced complexity and discontinuity, Banca Carige entered into a strategic partnership with Cerved, company that helps businesses, banks and institutions protect themselves from risk and grow sustainably, through which Carige supports its customers and the local footprint by providing a set of dedicated services, direct advice concerning Subsidised Financing issues.

To concretely allow the access to NRRP funds, businesses will be supported throughout the entire process to access the funds by the Group's relationship managers and by a dedicated team of consultants from Cerved FinLine, the company that provides end-to-end solutions for

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managing subsidised financing and that, in the two-year period 2020/2021 played a significant role for Italian businesses by providing services to support their needs during the pandemic emergency, managing about 100,000 applications for Subsidised Financing.

The advisory service uses the dedicated platform 'CercailBando' (Tender search), which includes every tender of active subsidised financing in Italy. This is a tool that can guide relationship managers in offering the most appealing incentives to the businesses and, thus, provide them with the specialised support of Cerved every step of the way: from the preliminary, formal and legal analysis of projects, to the official submission of the aid application to the Management Entity, until the final reporting.

The strategic partnership with Cerved will therefore expand exponentially to include tenders and initiatives within the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP).

In this context, Italy will be the biggest beneficiary, by absolute value, of the NextGenerationEU ('NGEU' or Recovery Fund), the largest stimulus package ever financed in Europe, receiving a total amount of EUR 235 bn by means of the Recovery and Resilience Facility, the National Complementary Fund and the REACT-EU programme. The NGEU is a unique opportunity for Italy, providing for development opportunities, investments and reforms to accelerate the green and digital transition, to improve the training of the workforce, and to achieve more equality of gender, territory and generation.

Among the sectors to which the NRRP funds are dedicated, the needs of Tourism, which has been hit more than others by the current pandemic, have become a priority: as key sector for the Italian economy1 and for the economy of the Group's reference regions, Tourism will thus receive EUR 8.14 bn (EUR 6.68 bn under the NRRP plus EUR 1.5 bn from the REACT-EU and the Complementary Fund). Thanks to its know-how and its presence in strongly touristic regions, Carige will be able to support businesses operating in the sector in accessing the Plan's tools for Tourism, while also renewing the offer of dedicated products.

"With the launch of the Futuro Liguria Project, we announced that Carige would stand by the side of businesses on our local footprint to face challenges that the greatest economic and

1 The Tourism sector directly generates 5% of Italy's GDP and accounts for 6% of the total direct employment, percentages which grow respectively to 7% and 12% in the Group's region of reference, whose economy and local footprint strongly reflect its tourism allure: Liguria has more than twice the amount of foreign travellers expenses and almost three times more seaside locations awarded with a Blue Flag compared to the national average.

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social revolution since the Second World War would pose" commented Francesco Guido, Chief Executive Officer of the Carige Group, "the opportunities for renewal and relaunch are priorities that the NRRP makes achievable. As of today, we are making tangible the transformation of ideas into concrete projects for the benefit of the community in order to guarantee a prosperous and sustainable future for the territory, its people and future generations".

"Our partnership with Carige is a concrete initiative that fully fits in Cerved's mission of supporting the Italian system in protecting itself from risks and in growing sustainably. - commented Andrea Mignanelli, CEO of Cerved Group - With "CercailBando" we inform even businesses that do not have specialised structures of the opportunities of the NRRP, in particular supporting SMEs in obtaining funds for digital and green transition processes. We strive to offer a valid support starting from the tourism sector, which was heavily impacted by the pandemic, but which can lead the recovery."

INVESTOR RELATIONS & RESEARCH

COMMUNICATIONS

tel. +39 010 579 4877

tel. +39 010 579 3380

investor.relations@carige.it

relazioni.esterne@carige.it

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Banca Carige S.p.A. Cassa di Risparmio di Genova e Imperia published this content on 03 December 2021 and is solely responsible for the information contained therein. Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on 03 December 2021 14:01:02 UTC.