Because banks and businesses are asking for the credit moratorium to be renewed
Banks, business associations and politicians are asking the government to confirm the support measures for companies, primarily the extraordinary credit moratorium. Here because. The article by Emanuela Rossi
Banks, business associations, politicians: the group of those asking the government to confirm the support measures for companies envisaged by the Cura Italia decree of 17 March 2020 and the Liquidity decree of 8 April 2020, issued in full lockdown, is quite large. Especially since the pandemic has not ended and the increase in the number of infections – and the related quarantines – threaten economic recovery.
THE PROBLEM OF MORATORY AND GUARANTEED FINANCING
Specifically, the Cura Italia dl (art.56) provided for an extraordinary moratorium on loans and credit lines for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises for companies damaged by Covid-19, until 31 December 2021, while the Liquidity dl introduced urgent measures to facilitate access to credit for businesses and has expanded the possibilities of using the guarantees granted by the State such as the SACE SpA Guarantee.
As announced by Confindustria, are at least 25 billions allocated to companies that are not able to resume payments. As Il Fatto Quotidiano recalls, a similar sum – 27 billion – results from the Guarantee Fund for SMEs, managed by Mediocredito Centrale: these are moratoriums advanced by companies that "first applied for guaranteed loans and then made the moratorium because they could not not even to pay the pre-amortization installments, consisting only of interest, and much lower than those that include the principal amount, which they will have to repay from this year ". "The risk – writes Nicola Borzi on the fact – is that, in the event of non-repayment of guaranteed and moratorium loans, all loans granted to companies in difficulty, including unsecured banking ones, should immediately be considered non-performing and trigger a wave of closures speeded up by the new EU rules ". In this way "a violent credit crunch would be unleashed that would strike a blow to a production system already grappling with the difficulties of the fourth wave of the pandemic and gasping for the need to deal with the monstrous increases in raw materials and energy ".
A matter that could have serious repercussions in Campania, as Il Mattino informs. "There are many companies in difficulty and we have solved it in various ways" says Amedeo Manzo, president of the Bcc of Naples who says: "Among the activities that have now had new problems due to Covid, we have granted new loans to some and others we have restructured the debt, extending it from 3 to 6 years. Payment difficulties concern about 30 per cent of the activities that have obtained funding ".
According to Confesercenti Campania “the government has completely forgotten about small and medium-sized enterprises in relation to mortgages, leasing and financing. In the new budget law – the president Vincenzo Schiavo points out – there is no trace of a provision of vital importance for thousands of companies, the extension until March 30 of the commitments made with the banks. Suffice it to say that 380,000 businesses in Campania are required to pay mortgages by January 31st ".
THE REQUESTS OF ABI …
At Palazzo Altieri the question could not go unnoticed and in the interview released on 30 December last to La Repubblica, the Abi president, Antonio Patuelli, recalled: "I had already drawn attention to the fact that '22 could be more complicated than ' 21 for banks, with the end of the moratoriums and the decalage of the other measures, starting with loan guarantees. But the health picture has changed since the beginning of December. This means that the budget maneuver and the government's maxi amendment itself refer to a framework that no longer exists, to a march towards the exit from the emergency that has stalled ”. Therefore, according to Patuelli, not only must the moratoriums not be stopped but “all the emergency economic and social measures, taken from spring 2020 onwards, must continue until the pandemic occurs. We are now back to war bulletin numbers, which is why I say that the measures, which have already been extended several times, must go on. I hope that the resumption of the emergency will be confirmed and that they will be rescheduled ”.
An appeal reformulated a few days later – and in a more official form – with a letter sent – together with the director general of ABI, Giovanni Sabatini – to the Prime Minister, Mario Draghi, to the governor of Bank of Italy, Ignazio Visco, and to the competent ministers. In the letter Palazzo Altieri “represented the importance of promptly reconfirming in their entirety all the support measures for businesses envisaged by the so-called Liquidity Decree of 8 April 2020, and subsequent amendments – reads a note -, with particular regard to guaranteed loans and the possibility of offering the public guarantee on restructuring operations of loans already disbursed primarily for small and medium-sized enterprises and both the SACE guarantee at 'market prices', also provided for by the aforementioned Liquidity Decree, was activated as soon as possible ".
In the letter, Patuelli and Sabatini also highlighted the need to urge the EU institutions "to restore the flexibility initially allowed by the EBA regarding the treatment of loans subject to 'concession' measures, such as moratoriums, and to change the threshold beyond which concession measures entail the reclassification of the debtor's entire position in the category of impaired loans ". "The requests made by ABI – reads the press release – arise from the violent resumption of the pandemic in Europe and Italy and from the consequences on economic activities together with the strong increases in energy prices and the persistence of difficulties in the supply chains of materials primaries and electronic components that have substantially changed the framework on the basis of which the support measures for businesses in the budget law were reshaped in a logic of gradual return to normal conditions that do not yet exist ".
… AND CONFAGRICOLTURA SUPPORT
Confagricoltura is on the same wavelength as ABI and appreciates Patuelli's intervention. "The initiative goes in the direction requested by Confagricoltura, which had already brought to the attention of the Executive the need to give continuity to the measures of the Liquidity Decree, fundamental in this moment in which the production capacity of companies is severely affected by the increase in production costs ”stated the president Massimiliano Giansanti. And again: “We share the ABI's appeal. Agricultural enterprises are throttled by the increase in the prices of raw materials, energy bills and the increasingly evident difficulties in procuring materials or components for production. The timid post-Covid recovery has also suffered a sudden slowdown due to the emergence of Italian and European economic situations, aggravated by the new wave of infections. We cannot afford to weaken our entrepreneurial fabric, which is already exhausted "highlighted the number one of Confagricoltura according to which" the stop to tax and banking moratoriums risks suffocating the farms that try hard to
restore adequate production levels. One could intervene by granting the extension under the 'Milleproroghe' Decree or the new Sostegni Decree. The lack of continuity of the credit instruments would prevent the system from keeping up, with further serious damage to the economy and employment ”.
THE CONCERNS OF POLITICS
Politics has also made its voice heard on the problem with statements by the parties in Palazzo Chigi. "I think the government should take initiatives after the letter from the ABI leaders proposing the extension of the measures for corporate liquidity" commented the senator of Forza Italia, Maurizio Gasparri, for which Patuelli's words put "clearly a series of issues that the government needs to examine quickly. The banking world has collaborated in this phase and rightly asks the government to pursue decisions that have proved invaluable and that must continue to produce their effects in the present and in the future ".
The same is true for Laura Castelli (M5S), Deputy Minister of Economy and Finance. “I embrace the cry of pain that comes from the business world and I agree with the critical issues raised by the ABI. In this phase – he added -, in which the health emergency still seems not to stop, we must continue to accompany companies to avoid a worsening of the economic situation and to ensure that the effects of the support measures adopted in these are not lost. years. This situation urgently requires the need to extend the measures introduced in 2020, when it was still difficult to hypothesize the end of the pandemic, such as those of the Liquidity Decree ". Also according to Castelli one way could be to use the “Milleproroghe” and thus continue “to guarantee the most affected sectors”.
The same instrument was also invoked by the Carroccio through Massimo Bitonci, leader of the League in the Budget Committee and head of the party's Productive Activities department, who presented an agenda for the maneuver "so that the Government undertakes to provide for this absolutely necessary and urgent measure in the first useful provision, for example in the next Milleproroghe decree ". Because "without the public guarantee on loans, the danger of a lack of liquidity is just around the corner".
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/economia/rinnovo-moratorie-credito/ on Sun, 09 Jan 2022 07:56:34 +0000.