Law change prompts KfW rebranding.

Financial News, August, 2003

Kreditanstalt fur Wiederaufbau, the German development bank, is to be rebranded this week as part of changes related to European Commission concerns about the state-owned institution's unfair funding advantage.The bank is one of the largest borrowers in the international bond markets and has been earmarked a new role to support mid-sized German companies in partnership with private banks. It will now be known as KfW.

It reported total lending of nearly [euro]55bn last year, only [euro]6bn of which stemmed from export and project finance, but it was this business that drew the attention of the Commission, which ruled that KfW's state guarantee gave it an unfair funding advantage over competitors.