The BNB complies with the guidelines and requests issued by the ECB and pursues the necessary measures for the implementation of the ECB’s legal acts under Regulation (EU) №1024/2013, including by issuing the necessary administrative acts. In this relation, the ECB exercises control over the implementation of all SSM guidelines and standards in the BNB’s work, including with regard to the supervisory review and evaluation process and on-site supervisions. The ECB is conferred specific direct powers towards less significant institutions, in relation to the process of license issuance and revocation, approvals of acquisition and disposal of classified holdings in credit institutions, the issuance of general recommendations, guidelines and instructions, planning and carrying out of on-site inspections, including assuming at any given point in time of direct supervision over less significant institutions. For the purposes of supervision of less significant banks, a structure has been set up with the ECB’s SSM, in which the BNB participates. Within this structure, the issues of supervision over less significant institutions of the SSM participating Member States are discussed. The participation in the Single Supervisory Mechanism also includes providing the ECB with all the information needed for the performance of the ECB’s tasks, including information subject to banking and professional secrecy. The ECB collects fees for conducting its supervisory activities and this principle will accordingly apply to the banks in Bulgaria. 2. Participation in the Single Resolution Mechanism The participation in the SRM follows from the participation in the SSM.

But they are particularly important in the case of innovative projects in Spain, where external finance comes mainly in the form of bank loans, due to the absence of sufficiently developed alternative capital markets, as evidenced by the fact that bond issues still represent barely 10% of the total finance received by Spanish non-financial corporations, compared with 40% in the USA. 9  See S. Fazzari, R. Hubbard and B. Petersen (1988), “Financing Constraints and Corporate Investment”, Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, vol. 1, pp. 141-206. 10 See A. Goodare and I. Tonks (1995), “Finance and Technological Change”, in P. Stoneman (ed. ), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation and Technological Change, Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 298-341. 14/18  Financing innovation  The most recent period has seen some growth of non-bank financing in Spain and a certain improvement in the allocation of bank financing compared with the period immediately before the crisis, during which the firms receiving credit were characterised by their low productivity and a high proportion of real estate assets on their balance sheets. This largely explains the low dynamism of aggregate productivity in that period.11 By contrast, in the recovery phase funds tended to go to firms with a comparatively more favourable economic and financial position and which were more productive.12 In any event, this relative improvement in the allocation of bank credit cannot be allowed to hinder the development of specific financial products to facilitate the financing and growth of small and/or newly created innovative firms.