Leasing Life reviews
latest results issued by national leasing
associations.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Access deeper industry intelligence
Experience unmatched clarity with a single platform that combines unique data, AI, and human expertise.
Austria
The Austrian leasing market experienced a 23%
decrease in new business volume to €5.26bn, according to Austrian
leasing association VÖL.
Considering cross-border business as well, the
impact was even heavier, mainly because of drops in the CEE
region.
Equipment leasing had a 28.3% drop to €1.26bn.
Vehicle leasing had a smaller 16% decrease, due to the scrappage
scheme promoted by the Austrian government. The only sector that
recorded an increase was the railway sector.
US Tariffs are shifting - will you react or anticipate?
Don’t let policy changes catch you off guard. Stay proactive with real-time data and expert analysis.
By GlobalDataVÖL forecasts a “slight upturn” in 2010,
although it expects figures to be well below 2008 values.
Bulgaria
Bulgaria saw overdue leasing payments rise by
14.3% in 2009’s final quarter, from €350m in the third quarter to
€402m. Year on year, fourth-quarter late payments were up an
astonishing 314%.
This compares to a fourth-quarter new business
total of just €122m, 13% higher than the previous quarter but 74%
down year on year. Currently, Bulgarian lessors have a combined
lease portfolio of €2.54bn, a total that shrank by 14.6% over the
course of 2009.
According to the Bulgarian National Bank,
defaults now make up some 15.8% of this total, compared to 1.6% at
the end of 2008.
Estonia
Estonia’s leasing market declined by 70% last
year, despite seeing a hike in new business during December. New
business in 2009 totalled EEK4.9bn (€313m), figures published by
the Bank of Estonia show.
There was a slight pick-up in December with
new business for the month totalling EEK452m (€29m) compared with a
monthly average for the year of around EEK370m. However, as this
was offset by a high number of leases coming to an end, the
country’s total leasing portfolio in fact declined by EEK557m to
EEK27.6bn.
France
Leasing among French businesses fell
23.5% last year, which France’s leasing association ASF described
as an “unprecedented drop” in the local market; worse even than the
19.6% recorded in 1993.
In total, new business volume was €18.9bn. The
steep decline of the first half of 2009 slowed down in the last
months of the year, the association said. Lease purchase business
had the steepest fall – with a 27% drop – while other forms of
financing declined almost 20%.
The sectors with the best performance were IT
and office equipment (down 3.8%), while wheeled asset lease
business fell 23.9%.
Finland
Finnish lessors were not as heavily
impacted by the financial crisis as most of their European
counterparts in 2009, according to figures published by the
Federation of Finnish Financial Services.
While car and commercial vehicle leasing
volume decreased by around 35%, industrial equipment leasing was
40% up. IT and office equipment leasing also increased by 7%.
Credit losses accounted only for 0.6% of
lessors’ balance sheets, and the association does not expect them
to fall at a higher level this year. It said that for 2010 the
outlook is “cautiously positive”.
Germany
New German leasing business fell almost 23%
last year to €42.1bn, according to estimates from the country’s
Institute for Economic Research.
Equipment leasing was 22.7% down – with a
sharp decline in vehicle and production machinery leasing, whereas
IT and office equipment only saw a 4.8% drop. While the type of
customers has remained unchanged, the public sector has increased
its use of leasing – from 3.8% of total volumes in 2008 to 4.2%
last year. A survey conducted by German leasing association BDL
revealed that around two-thirds of the independent lessors and 36%
of bank-owned lessors had to forego new business opportunities in
the second half of 2009 on account of refinancing difficulties.
Italy
Italy’s leasing dropped 33% to
€26.1bn, the latest Assilea figures show. Leasint was the top
company with an annual leasing volume of €4.3bn, overtaking
UniCredit Leasing which posted €4bn in its Italian market. The top
five companies also included UBI Leasing, Banca Agrileasing and MPS
Leasing & Factoring.
All major sectors (vehicle, equipment and real
estate leasing) fell by some 30%.
December figures showed a slight (2.5%)
increase compared with December 2008 – the first increase in 18
months.
Poland
Leasing business in Poland fell around 30% to
PLN23bn (€5.9bn) last year, according to figures published by the
country’s leasing association ZPL.
Equipment and vehicle financing reached
PLN20.9bn – around PLN300m above expectations – but real estate
decreased more than anticipated, the association said. The local
market recorded an improvement in all sectors in the last quarter
of the year, particularly in the financing of light commercial
vehicles, which saw an increase of 7.9% during the year. HGV
leasing was 50% down compared with 2008. Industry equipment and
machinery leasing fell 21%.
The top three companies last year were
Europejski Fundusz Leasingowy, BRE Leasing and Raiffeisen Leasing
Polska.
Romania
Romania could experience widespread leasing
business failure if market contraction continues into 2010, the
country’s leasing association ALB has warned.
ALB’s statistics for leasing in 2009 put total
business volume for the nation at €1.33bn, some 72% down
year-on-year.
Jean-Claude Boloux, head of ALB, predicted
stagnation or single-digit improvement in volumes for 2010, but
admitted that further decline was possible, carrying the threat of
bankruptcy for domestic lessors.
Slovakia
Slovak lessors saw a deterioration of the
market last year, according to the country’s Association of Leasing
Companies (ALS). New business volume fell by over 45% to €1.5bn,
mainly because of a steep decline during the first six months of
the year.
Insolvencies deepened, heavily affecting
smaller lessors. ALS chairman Juraj Ebringer said that leasing
volumes have now stabilised to around half of the level of previous
years.
UniCredit Leasing Slovakia was the market
leader, followed by CSOB Leasing and Volkswagen Financne sluzby
Slovensko.
Spain
Spain’s leasing business fell significantly
last year, as demand for investment from SMEs collapsed across the
country.
According to the Asociación Española de
Leasing (AEL), Spanish lessors wrote €7bn of new business, exactly
half the equivalent figure for 2008.
Equipment leasing totalled €5.3bn, compared to
€11.4bn the previous year. Real estate leasing fell from €2.5bn to
€1.7bn.
On a quarterly basis, there have already been
two quarters of growth as SMEs start to invest again in new
equipment.
The province of La Rioja in northern Spain was
the hardest hit. Madrid and Extremadura, however, reported an
increase of around 35%.
UK
Finance and Leasing Association
(FLA) statistics have revealed a 33% drop in new business during
last year. In the 12 months to December 2009, new production in the
UK leasing industry was £19.3bn (€21.7bn), representing a fall of
one-third compared to December 2008.
By asset, the highest decrease was
in big ticket business, which in 12 months was 42% down. Car
finance and general asset finance dropped 25 and 34% respectively.
By product, operating leasing was less heavily affected (with a 22%
drop), while finance leasing was 43% down.
