Favourable first quarter
results mean Dexia could be back in business
Go deeper with GlobalData
Access deeper industry intelligence
Experience unmatched clarity with a single platform that combines unique data, AI, and human expertise.
Despite being hit by the recession,
LeasePlan is far from having a touch of the blues – at least
judging by its recent round of deal breaking.
In recent weeks, while at the time being the
subject of a fresh takeover, its Norwegian arm signed an enormous
€11.4 million deal with Helseforetakenes Innkjøpsservice AS
(HINAS), a health care purchasing body equivalent to the UK’s NHS
PASA.
LeasePlan managed to win the deal – for the
lease over two years of ambulances and other motor vehicles – after
fighting off competition from five other rival bidders.
The deal followed its agreement with Consip,
an Italian public stock company, for the whopping €8.8 million
lease of 560 commercial vehicles under a 12-month long-term rental
agreement. LeasePlan, which has a longstanding relationship with
Consip, offered a no less than 14 percent reduction on normal lease
rental prices.
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 GlobalDataPromoting electric
cars
Meanwhile, in recent weeks – as well
as also having signed a lease partnership with Renault-Nissan
Alliance to promote electric cars – its management signed an
agreement for the sale of half the company’s shares to German
investment company Fleet Investment, owned by German banker
Friedrich von Metzler.
This followed the decision by LeasePlan’s two
Gulf co-investors – Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Development Company and
Saudi Arabia’s Olayan Group – to divest their stakes in the lessor.
The joint venture means that VW will no longer need to take up the
remaining stake of LeasePlan by itself.
In April, hyperactive Lease-Plan, which also
recently agreed to finance 11 vans for heating and electric
specialist Hewer Facilities Management after troubled Lex Vehicle
Leasing pulled out of the deal, launched a leasing operation in
Mexico, meaning it now has businesses in no less than 29 countries
worldwide.
After a poor
performance
All this frenetic activity comes on
the back of not only performing poorly in 2008, with net income
dropping by 13.7 percent to €208 million, but also a statement in
April from its CEO Vahid Daemi that, due to the economic downturn,
it will slow down its expansion plans in several countries.
Perhaps the lessor’s boundless enthusiasm for
deal breaking can partly be traced to the fact that, despite seeing
a drop in net income, its number of units under management in 2008
in fact grew by 5.8 percent to reach 1.4 million, while its lease
portfolio expanded by 2.5 percent, or €348 million, to €14.2
billion – equating to an increase of 7.6 percent, once currency
fluctuations are taken into account.
Energetic return
Meanwhile, another lessor that looks
set to return to leasing with its former boundless energy is Dexia
Bail, the French leasing subsidiary of the Franco-Belgian
company.
Last month its parent reported a net profit of
€251 million, down 13 percent from €289 million a year earlier, but
still significantly higher than the €106 million of profits
expected by analysts.
Dexia Bail, which in recent months has signed
some small-ish public sector deals, last year did what the likes of
Lloyds TSB is currently trying to do – muscle in on the rail
finance sector.
In the wake of a reduction in rolling stock
debt being offered by the Roscos – which at the time were under
pressure from a competition commission investigation now completed
– Dexia Bail signed no less than three major public sector rolling
stock deals in as many months. This included the mega €400 million
deal for the financing of 60 trains for the Metro de Madrid.
In 2006 Dexia was responsible for the largest
metro finance deal ever put together in Spain, worth €1.2 billion.
With its financial results as healthy as they are, expect to see
far more on Dexia in the pages of this magazine in the months to
come.
Brendan Malkin
