The world’s financing needs multiplied rapidly from 2020 onward owing to the effects of a systemic crisis considered to have been the worst global crisis since the Second World War: that unleashed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, flows from China, FDI and other inflows of international cooperation and multilateral resources which had been the largest in the region for some years fell back from their pre-pandemic levels.

In this context, the debate about the fundamental role of development banks in alleviating market constraints in a crisis has come to the fore. The present study seeks to contribute to that debate by analysing information compiled in a database of multilateral, regional, subregional and national development bank financing measures, priorities and amounts in Latin America and the Caribbean for the specific purpose of addressing the needs of the countries given the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic between 2020 and 2021.

Over its different chapters, the study presents a number of stylized facts derived from the behaviour of these institutions in the region in the face of the recent crisis caused by the pandemic, which support the assertions made here about the role of development banks.

The results show that, in a particular crisis context such as the one produced by COVID-19, development banks proved to be one of the most powerful tools for helping to check the speed of the economic collapse, catalyse the financial recovery of firms and achieve different development objectives for the population by responding with countercyclical financing and minimizing the hysteresis ensuing on the crisis.