Council agreed on the main elements of the Competitiveness of Enterprises and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) Programme called COSME. COSME should operate with a budget of 2.5 billion euros for the whole period of MFF 2014-2020. The draft of COSME programme includes two financial instruments: the equity facility and the loan guarantee facility, both designed to facilitate SME access to finance.

The instruments will be managed by the European Investment Fund in cooperation with financial institutions in the Member States. In addition to advantages for SMEs, the programme is expected to increase the EU's GDP by 1.1 billion euros and to create around 30,000 jobs per year. COSME will extend current "Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme", which will expire at the end of 2013.

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