Euro Area Firms Face 42% Loan-Rate Jump as 12-Month Price Expectations Ease to 3.2%
Updated
Updated · investinglive.com · Jul 20
Euro Area Firms Face 42% Loan-Rate Jump as 12-Month Price Expectations Ease to 3.2%
3 articles · Updated · investinglive.com · Jul 20
Summary
A net 42% of euro area firms reported higher bank-loan rates in Q2, up from 26% in Q1, while overall access to bank credit stayed broadly stable.
SMEs felt the squeeze more acutely: their credit access deteriorated slightly even as large firms reported improvement, pushing the ECB’s bank-loan financing gap up to 3% from 2%.
Inflation signals softened as firms cut 12-month selling-price expectations to 3.2% from 3.5%, non-labour cost growth to 5.2% from 5.8%, and wage growth to 2.5% from 2.8%.
The survey still showed caution on the outlook, with firms more pessimistic on future sales and profits and continuing to cite the general economic outlook as the main obstacle to external financing.
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