“The Confidi do not experience a subjective situation of difficulty. It is the Italian production system as a whole that is experiencing a particular situation”. That's what he said the director general of Eurofidi Andrea Giotti speaking in Florence at the 6th national conference of Confidi. "The activity of Confidi in a changing economy: supervisory obligations, new business areas, organizational and commercial solutions".
“The Confidi, which normally support the weakest part of the entrepreneurial system – he added -, are consequently suffering. In this context, Eurofidi lives in a position of relative tranquility due to some important choices made in the past years which are proving to be successful".
Between these:
- A highly diversified collateral portfolio in both territorial and sectoral terms;
– a massif use of forms of risk mitigation (to date, over 70% of the stock of guarantees, which amount to a total of €3,7 billion, is backed by counter-guarantees);
- A solvency index as of 31/12/2011, still provisional, that is 11% (almost double the amount imposed by the Bank of Italy).
The general manager also announced that Eurofidi in 2012 will carry out a strategic repositioning of its business: after more than thirty years dedicated to supporting SMEs in obtaining credit, it will also support companies in raising equity.
1. Indeed, one of the factors limiting the development of companies is their undercapitalization. Eurofidi therefore hopes to be able to help reduce this limit. The project is based on the hypothesis that a direct flow of resources arises between individuals and companies, with Eurofidi which will be able to guarantee up to 50% of any capital losses that will arise from such operations. Instead of guaranteeing credit, in this case Eurofidi will offer guarantees for capital increases subscribed by natural or legal persons. In this way, the capitalization of companies could improve.
2. Another line of development which will be implemented during 2012 will be direct intervention in all those operations carried out by SMEs which require diversified forms of guarantee, as forms of direct guarantee between one company and another. For example, it will be possible to replace the security deposits against rental contracts of company properties with sureties granted by Eurofidi. Also in this case, it will be an intervention aimed at operations that will tend to support the growth of SMEs, freeing up liquidity commitments and/or supporting the phases of their development on the markets.
3. On the other hand, the third line, focused on a support the disbursement of smaller loans by credit institutions. In this case, Eurofidi will go beyond the logic of investigation on the individual company to approach a "portfolio" logic, with undoubted advantages both on the costs of the procedures and on the speed of response times.
