The Factoring market

The Italian market

The Italian factoring market, which represents a share of, respectively, 8% of the world market and more than 13% of the European market, saw a slight decline, in 2013, with total turnover of registered factoring providers above 171.5 billion euros (equal to -2.13% from the previous year), in contrast with the growth of the European and world markets.

Nonetheless, it is worth stressing that the Italian market has grown by more than 43% over the past five years, ranking it as the leading market in Europe by volume of international factoring transactions and the third largest in the world after China and Taiwan.

Total turnover in Italy (in millions of euro)

 
Data: EU Federation for the Factoring and Commercial Finance Industry
 

The first months of 2014 are also indicating a U-turn in the volume of purchased receivables compared to 2013, with a partial increase of 4.41% compared to the same period last year, although receivables outstanding at the end of the first quarter 2014 still recorded a significant drop compared to the same period of 2012 (-2.90%), suggesting an improvement in the turnover of receivables.
In detail, non-recourse factoring accounts for 65% of total transactions on the Italian market, compared to 35% of operations dedicated to recourse factoring.

The factoring industry has obviously been affected by the difficulties faced for some years by the Italian economic and financial environment, as well as the fall in the purchase of receivables by the Public Administration. However, by virtue of its specific characteristics, factoring nevertheless continues to represent an interesting and effective opportunity to use resources to prevent the absorption of capital in the hands of banking groups, banks and specialist brokers.

The international market

The international context is a very important development focus for all factoring providers, including those in Italy. The volume of international factoring has, in effect, increased tenfold over the last 15 years and its total share in the activity of factoring providers has moved, over a decade, from 7% to 18%.


As for the data for 2013, the global factoring market reported growth of almost 5%, in line with the trend already recorded in the previous year. Global turnover exceeded 2,230 billion euros.

With regard to individual markets, 2013 saw yet another expansion of the Chinese market, albeit on a smaller scale than in previous years, with turnover of almost 378 billion euros (+ 10% compared to 2012) which puts it in first place in the world, ahead of the United Kingdom, France and Italy.

Data: EU Federation Factoring & Commercial Finance

The European market

The European market for factoring maintained an overall good performance in 2013, recording an annual increase of more than 5% (so in line with world). The UK remains the star performer of the European market, followed by France and, closely, by Italy.

Overall European turnover amounted in 2013 to 1.259 trillion euros, confirming its generally constant growth over the last five years, despite some differences in trend in the various countries of the continent.

The European factoring market

Data: EU Federation for the Factoring and Commercial Finance Industry