External development affecting our investment process

Last year, we increased our financial and non-financial support to help customers cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. However, while its impact subsided in the course of 2022, new unforeseen events emerged. The war in Ukraine impacted the local and regional portfolio. We closely monitored developments in the region and assessed the impact of the war, including sanctions, on our customers. In addition, we decided that all Clearance in Principle (CiP) decisions for new transactions in the region required approval from FMO's Credit department, a team that provides advice and grants credit and terms for individual transactions.

Also noteworthy was the FATF blacklisting of Myanmar in October 2022. As we have several investments in this country, we performed an in-depth impact assessment of our customer portfolio, including enhanced due diligence on each customer in the country.

Furthermore, following the devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, that occurred in February 2023, we reached out to all of our customers in Turkey (currently we have no exposure in Syria). A few customers have part of their assets in the wider area affected by the earthquake, but preliminary assessment did not result in any reclassification of our credit risk. Monitoring of potential future impact will be a key point of attention in the first half of 2023.