The Nordic Investment Bank (NIB) has completed a series of deals supporting projects and SMEs.

The largest investment is a 19-year €114mn loan to Lithuanian railway company AB Lietuvos Gelezinkeliai for the construction of a new track and for the modernisation of the Trans-European East-West corridors in Lithuania.

The loan will support the 115km of new track linking the second city of Kaunas with the Lithuanian-Polish border, as well as the rebuilding of a 60km track from Šiauliai to the Lithuanian-Latvian border.

It has also signed a €10mn 10-year loan with Estonia’s state own transmission system operator, Elering AS. The loan will be used to construct a new power connection, Estlink-2, across the Gulf of Finland, linking the Nordic countries to their Baltic counterparts. It’s the second time the IFI has lent to the 650MW project, having issued two loans worth €45mn in 2010. The interconnection is expected to be completed by 2014 and will cover more than two thirds of Estonia’s electricity consumption.

Finally, NIB has opened a credit line with Finland’s Säästöpankki Optia to lend to Finnish SMEs. A loan of €15mn will be disbursed to Optia’s clients in order to boost production capacity and finance environmental projects.