June 17, 2013, 02:06 / Finance

Businesses are tired of taking loans

Problems in the economy crippled lending growth in May, which was already unfavorable for banks. Corporate debts increased by less than 1% over the month Tatyana Voronova In May, borrowers cooled towards banks - both in receiving new and in repaying old loans / E. Kuzmina / Vedomosti

It cannot be said that loans to the economy are not being issued - the process is ongoing, but the demand for loans is no longer growing at the same pace as before, says First Vice President of Gazprombank Ekaterina Trofimova. Many companies have declining revenues and “in the face of ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, they are not increasing their debt,” she explains. Many have also seen their investment activity decrease, and some of the prime borrowers have chosen to enter the debt market rather than increase loans.

Russian banks are reducing the pace of lending to households and companies. At the end of May, the growth of corporate debts slowed from April 2.1 to 0.7%, retail debts - from 3.2 to 2.7%, according to Central Bank data. In May last year, loans grew by 2.3 and 4%, respectively. Against this background, overdue debts are growing at an accelerated pace - by 1.6 and 4.5% per month, respectively. This year, banks earn less than last year: in January–May they received 391.2 billion rubles. profit – 6% lower than for the same period in 2012.

Earlier, First Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank Alexei Simanovsky said that in recent months there has been a noticeable trend towards reducing risky unsecured lending to individuals: “I am now looking not at the growth rate, but at the trend. And the trend suits me. Nothing more can be done through regulation; then it’s all about supervisory actions in this or that bank.” He noticed that last year at the peak of growth the rate reached 60%, but now it has halved. Simanovsky believes that high rates are the reason for the decrease in demand for loans from companies and the population. The average rate on loans to companies from January to April increased by 1.4 percentage points to 10.2%. If you look at the average nominal rates on loans to the real sector, they are even slightly lower than before the 2008 crisis, Trofimova notes.

In the second half of the year, banks expect renewed demand for loans. Although over the past few quarters the risks of a decrease in demand for loans from non-financial organizations have increased, in general the growth rate of bank lending remains at a fairly high level, says the Central Bank review, and in the third and fourth quarters banks expect an increase in demand for loans from companies.

The slowdown in lending occurs against the backdrop of declining borrower profits. The financial results of Russian companies in the first quarter, according to Rosstat, became the worst since the beginning of the crisis: the balance of profits and losses decreased by almost 30%. The Ministry of Economic Development worsened its annual forecast, cutting growth expectations from 3.7 to 2.4% in 2013, and Minister Andrei Belousov warned of the risk of recession.

In May, banks' debt to the Central Bank increased significantly - up to 2.5 trillion rubles. as of June 1, in May the growth was 11.4%, or 253.4 billion rubles. The main effect was caused by the increase in the debt of credit institutions to the Central Bank on repo operations (+184.4 billion rubles), in 2nd place - loans against non-market assets (+93.6 billion rubles), calculated BKF-Bank analyst Maxim Osadchiy. The main contribution to the growth of credit institutions' debt to the Central Bank on repo transactions was made by Sberbank, where it increased by 136 billion rubles. The reason for the increase in debt is the May holidays, Osadchy explains: before them, banks got rid of unnecessary funds from the Central Bank, and then returned to the level of 2 trillion rubles.