Given that it is not true that banks do not grant credit, the fact remains that "the high degree of risk that continues to weaken bank balance sheets" acts as an "obstacle to access to credit for companies".
Looking ahead, "normalization will take place with the continuation of the recovery strategy and structural reforms on which the return of the Italian economy to sustainable growth depends", but in any case, there will be no recourse to dirigiste measures and prices administered for banks.
It is along these lines that the director general of the Bank of Italy, Fabrizio Saccomanni, consulted by the Industry Commission of the Senate, has moved.
and . Saccomanni rattles off the numbers: at the end of last year loans amounted to around 1.950 billion, equal to over 120 percent of GDP. At the same date, there were more than 30 million customers with credit lines exceeding 4 euros.
Loans to firms in distressing conditions more than doubled between 2008 and 2011. Admittedly, between October and December the annual growth rate of loans to the private sector fell from 4,2% to 2,3%. especially for companies characterized by a high degree of risk. But the latest quarterly survey by Bank of Italy shows that there is a "significant decrease in the share of businesses that signal a worsening of credit access conditions".
But, warns Saccomanni, "it is too early for a decisive trend reversal in the trend of credit flows to be recorded".
Because if on the one hand the ECB funds are slowly being transmitted to the credit markets, on the other hand, however, "the experience relating to the period following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers indicates that it will take a few months before the unconventional monetary policy measures are reflect on price dynamics”.
Credit Observatory. The Bank of Italy rejects it without appeal. “The regulation of the Observatory's functions deserves to be revised. It is good that the assessment of loan requests remains entrusted to intermediaries, it is desirable that the power of the Observatory to assess critical issues in the procedure for granting or revoking loans by banks be eliminated, just as it seems to reject hypotheses of modification of the 'articled tending to attribute to the Bank of Italy a power of control or to provide for an intervention by the observatory on subjects, such as transparency, already fully governed by sector legislation”.
Commissionthe. "In recent years, legislative interventions have not been well calibrated at a national level". According to the General Manager of Bankitalia, “many issues, including the question of the remuneration of credit lines and overdrafts, had to come back repeatedly. Many measures have been adopted on a contingent basis in the absence of an organic project. Access to funding must be ensured by a context that stimulates the selection of the most deserving initiatives. It is necessary to avoid solutions that could lead to misunderstandings about the existence of a generalized right to credit or from dirigiste measures that introduce administered prices”.
"Within this framework it is quite possible, indeed necessary, to question the adequacy of the legal framework and introduce new provisions that take into account the evolution of both the supply policies of the banks and the financial needs of households and businesses." “It is desirable – concludes di Saccomanni – that this takes place in such a way as to ensure the organic nature of the interventions and the stability of the rules over time”.
