Strategic insight: ING’s Rauhala on balancing sweet and sour in structured export finance
In her first interview since taking over as global head of structured export finance at ING, Anna Rauhala discusses finding the right balance between sweet and sour in the recipe to structure export financings, and her undimmed enthusiasm for the bank’s role in the energy transition and projects related to climate change.

TXF: It’s good news about your new position heading up structured export finance (SEF) at ING. Your predecessor, Michiel de Vries had been at the bank for more than 30 years, with nearly a decade as head of SEF. How did you come to the role?
Anna Rauhala (AR): I’m excited to be taking on this new role of global head of SEF at ING. Michiel brought us a lot of experience and knowledge in this area, and I have been working closely with him for several years, which has been great.
In my previous role, I headed the export finance business in the Nordics, UK and the Netherlands, out of Amsterdam, and then also the Africa inbound business. Now I’ve expanded my scope to global. The core of the business is very similar globally. But I'm also really looking forward to learning more about the different markets that are covered by our global team, and their differences and nuances. We have a great business and a great team in place, and I plan to continue to build on that in my new role.
I grew up in Finland. I’ve 23 years’ experience in banking at three different banks. I started my career after university in New York, and worked there for eight years, first at Nordea Bank and then at SEB (Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken), then I repatriated to Europe, first to Brussels at ING, and then ING Bank in the Netherlands.
My whole career has been focused on servicing our clients in different areas of the bank, and client coverage in transaction services, and for the past several years in structured export finance. Client interactions give me a lot of energy and that has been the driving force between all the different functions.
TXF: What new flavour do you think you will be bringing to the role?
AR: I like ‘people’ initiatives, as it’s key to a company’s success. I’ve led several initiatives around diversity and inclusion and want to make sure we continue to have variety in our teams. In my global SEF team, we already have a great, diverse group of people that have very different backgrounds and nationalities, and this diversity ensures that we bring new ideas and knowledge from different areas to our clients.
Our SEF colleagues tend to be very motivated about the job because, what’s not to be motivated about? We're doing a lot of sustainable, social and development finance. And we are also proud to be one of the leading export finance banks globally.
ING is a very strong sector bank with deep knowledge in all the different industries that we have teams in. Going forward I want to ensure that sector collaboration continues on a global scale. The fact we work in teams with our industry and export finance experts gives added value to our clients and through this tight collaboration we expect to grow the business and deepen our client relationships further.
TXF: At TXF in Athens last summer Michiel de Vries highlighted the importance of addressing heightened geopolitical uncertainties, sluggish economic growth, ongoing conflicts, climate risks, and energy security concerns – are these still the top concerns at ING and how are they impacting deal flow? What trends in the ECA-backed market are exciting you, and what are concerning you?
AR: It may seem the obvious answer, but what most excites me is our specific role in the energy transition and projects that are related to climate change. Export finance is and will be very important when it comes to these types of projects. ECAs will continue to play an essential role in financing. For example, when financing new technologies that are needed to reach climate goals we need government support for clients through ECAs to make these projects bankable. It is also fascinating to see different kinds of innovations and new technologies around the topic of circular economy. We need close collaboration between commercial banks and governments for projects that are risky or really challenging for our risk appetite.
On the challenging side, 2024 was a turbulent year globally and geopolitically. I'm really interested and curious to see, for example, what the new US administration will pick up as their main agenda and how that will impact global trade. There’s a lot of discussion about implementing import tariffs, and we have seen that the export market was a bit smaller in 2024 than the year earlier, so we will have to see if there will be any impact. I also hope 2025 will bring some stability in the geopolitical arena.
TXF: You mentioned the market's been slower in 2024, but have you seen any specific impact of the of the OECD Consensus reforms in terms of tenor extensions and any impact on prices, or is there not the appetite?
AR: This is a tough one. There is certainly a lot of push from borrowers, especially in emerging markets, to extend tenors. Everyone is still trying to wrap their heads around what this actually means. It is so difficult to imagine what the world will look like in 10, 15 or even 20 years. At the same time, we have to be prepared to provide very long term financings, especially to developing markets, because they are essential for the energy transition.
I see constant pressure on prices as well. It really comes down to finding the right balance between sweet and sour – credit risk, tenor, acceptable pricing. There’s not an easy answer.
TXF: In terms of ING specifically, do you still think you will be in the top 10 lenders in 2025. What is your pipeline looking like?
AR: Absolutely, it’s our strong ambition to remain in the top 10 globally and certainly in our home market of Europe. We do have a strong pipeline and a lot of really nice commercial initiatives with some of the ECAs. I absolutely expect that we will be a top export finance bank going forward as well.
TXF: A sizeable portion of your deals in 2024 have been in the European transport sector, particularly in EV related gigafactories and batteries production, both ECA backed and not. Have the challenges faced by certain companies and sectors changed your desire to support more of these deals? What is the position now with Northvolt, for example?
AR: It has certainly been a very interesting year. We've all seen what has happened with some of these gigafactories, but at the same time, that is a key element to making EVs. In 2023, almost one in every five new cars that were sold globally were electric compared to 2018, when only 2% of the new cars sold globally were electric.
Although there has been a little bit of a slowdown in the rate of growth of EV sales it remains a growing market. Ultimately, we want to support our clients in the transition to net zero, and we will also continue to support them in the EV space, within our risk appetite.
TXF: Has that risk appetite changed at all because of Northvolt?
AR: It doesn't make it easier, but we are looking for solutions and we are finding them. In December we were part of the bank group that also financed the new interim financing for Automotive Cells Company (ACC), so we very much continue to be in this space.
TXF: Given the challenges, how do you view ING’s role in supporting new technology and the energy transition?
AR: Climate change is the word. The urgency to act here is only growing. We aim to be there to play a leading role in helping our clients to get to the low carbon economy. We also realise that we must be able to finance the new technologies related to this. Luckily at ING, we have a lot of experts working in this area and they're looking at deals in different stages of development.
There are very new technologies and new business models, and we have sustainable value chains and sustainable investment teams that are looking into those clients that need financing or investments across sectors. And of course we have our sector teams that will continue to support with their knowledge and expertise, like the energy sector for example.
TXF: Are you continuing to push for an equitable energy transition in emerging markets?
AR: We are financing large, high impact, sustainable and social transactions in the emerging markets. For example, the large solar park in Angola [US Exim has approved $1.6 billion in direct loans to support building of 65 solar mini grids and storage in Angola, including a $872 million direct loan from US Exim to the Ministry of Energy and Water of Angola to help build two photovoltaic solar energy power plants, a deal which closed in April 2024, with ING Capital, Sun Africa and Omatapalo involved].
We have done this with EKN and US Exim so far and expect to continue to do these projects whenever they fit in our risk appetite. I keep mentioning risk appetite, but it is a very important factor.
TXF: Which other sectors are you likely to be supporting?
AR: If you look at TXF Intelligence data on which sectors mostly benefit from ECA finance, then it perfectly matches what we are looking at. That means transportation and logistics, energy and a number of their subsectors and sectors such as telecoms, health care, commodities, food and agri, financial institutions.
TXF: How important is ECA support to secure your participation on a deal? Also, are you working with DFIs and MDBs, and is there a difference in approach by and to them from ING’s perspective?
AR: The answer is yes, they are important and yes we are. We see a lot of benefits from ECA support, whether that be longer tenors or higher risk of the borrowers or the borrowing countries, or pricing or risk weighted assets’ reduction.
When it comes to new technologies, their cover is essential for ING and other banks to make them bankable. It often comes down to a good mix of ECA cover, clean financing and credit and political risk insurance (CPRI). We also see our clients using the products of various development banks and multilaterals, which can be in the same transactions as the ECA cover, or in subsequent transactions.
We have also seen a rise of domestic sovereign cover providers, for example, the UK National Wealth Fund, which was formerly the UK Infrastructure Bank. We treat these in a similar way to the ECAs in our way of working, which is also in line with some of our peers.
They are covered from the same global team at ING, especially because we have seen an increase of domestic and green covers and the difference between multilateral and domestic covers is not that big. However, these are not all then directly related to an export angle.
TXF: You mentioned CPRI. How important is it for your deal structuring?
AR: It is often part of the package and remains important. If it’s needed, we will go for it, through our team in London.
TXF: What will be the most important key trends for you over the coming year?
AR: We are in a bit of a ‘wait and see’ in terms of what happens in the geopolitical situation, particularly with import tariffs and if there will be new types of covers. Domestic and green covers are really taking off, especially when it comes to energy transition related projects. I’m interested in seeing what happens with in the EV space and where we will be building these new factories.