The US equipment finance industry recorded just 3% growth year-on-year for 2013, after a disappointing December new business volumes, according to data released by the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association (ELFA).
December new business volumes among the 25 companies surveyed in the organisation’s monthly index was $10.7bn (7.83bn), down 7% on December 2012.
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The figure was 62% up on the $6.6bn seen in November but, as the month is traditionally a time of spiking business volumes in the industry, the growth failed to improve on the previous year’s volumes.
The fall of 7% reversed November’s growth of 3% year-on-year and limited overall annual growth to 3% compared to 2012.
In addition, late payments over 30 days rose very slightly from 1.8% of receivables to 1.9% and the previous month’s delinquent payments over 90 days rose from November’s 1.8%
Slightly better news came in the form of write offs which remained at the all time low from November of 0.3%.
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By GlobalDataIn a sign that the market was seeing a sustainable recovery, however, credit approvals continued to rise. December saw 78.3% of all applications approved, which compares to 76.5% on November and more than made up for the slight drop of that month.
Ten percent more, or 57%, of participants also found that they were sending more transactions for approval.
This rise in transactions was reflected in ELFA’s monthly confidence index, which was up to 64.9 in January compared to 55.8 in December 2013.
