In August, bank loans to Italian businesses and households recorded a new decline, the twenty-eighth consecutive, with an annual contraction of 1,09%. The August figure is an estimate by the ABI which in its monthly report looks at the glass half full: the decline in August is slighter and such a limited decline has not been recorded since July 2012. Overall loans in August recorded a -2,3, 2,5% per annum, slowing down from July (-2007% per annum). Loans to households and businesses, however, since the pre-crisis period (end of 1.279) have grown, notes the ABI, from 1.418 to XNUMX billion.
Even bad debts are still rising to record levels, as the crisis and its effects continue. In July, again according to the monthly report by the ABI, gross non-performing loans increased to 172,3 billion, from 170,3 billion in June. The ratio between gross non-performing loans and loans thus rose to 9% (it was 7,2% in July last year) and has not touched this threshold since October 1998.
The ratio between gross non-performing loans and loans reached 15,3% for small economic operators (it was 12,9% a year earlier), 14,8% for companies (11,3% in July last year ) and 6,6% for consumer families (6% in the same month of 2013). Even net non-performing loans, according to the Palazzo Altieri report, show an increase, going from 77 billion in June to 78,2 billion in July. The ratio of net non-performing loans to total loans was 4,30% in July, up from 4,22% in June (it was 3,85% in July last year).
