There is a credit alarm on the island, with thousands of businesses at risk .
This was reported by Cna, concerned "not only by the high cost of money", but also by "the speed with which banks have tightened credit conditions in the last year ".
From the report of the artisan organization it can be seen that in the second quarter of 2023 the interest rate requested by banks from Sardinian companies rose to 7.4% and is destined to increase further : to date the cost for a liquidity credit of 100 thousand euros to be repaid in 36 months it has grown from 7,700 to 11,800 euros, + 53%. Just to give an example, a Sardinian company that asks a credit institution for a loan of 500 thousand euros to be repaid over ten years will have to pay around 164 thousand euros in interest compared to around 49 thousand due two years ago.
For Cna, compared to the other regions of Italy , the island pays a gap of over 1.5 percentage points on the average rates charged to companies for liquidity needs , 1.8 points for the service sector . Furthermore, for small businesses (those with fewer than 20 employees) compared to medium-large ones, the average annual interest rate for liquidity needs is almost double: 10.2%, compared to 5.4%.
«In a context of strong economic uncertainty, fueled by inflation expectations, restrictive monetary policies and international crises, island companies, especially if smaller in size, find themselves facing a strong tightening of financial conditions which places them at a disadvantage compared to counterparts in other regions - comment Luigi Tomasi and Francesco Porcu , respectively president and regional secretary of the Cna Sardinia -. We are faced with a worrying phenomenon of credit restriction that will put thousands of companies at risk of default. Sardinia is the seventh region in Italy in terms of investment financing costs."
(Unioneonline/vl)
