As this is our first correspondence for 2014 I should say Happy New Year although we are already at the beginning of the third month of the year. I can see that this year will be a very busy one with the level of enquiry that we are already receiving. I hope that you all are also experiencing what seems to be a general lift in the market.
Before I get into the “Business stuff” I thought I would congratulate Brendon McCullum on his NZ Test Batting record. What a great Captains knock, I think he is showing a “follow me” leadership quality that the NZ cricket team is thriving under. It certainly made writing my comments a bit more exciting flicking between my “Word document” and “Cricinfo” as he was scoring his runs.
Leadership is certainly one of the major qualities that we all need to be mindful of in whatever role we may be in within our organisations. This is based on a positive attitude. Talking to a lot of Accountants and Bankers they all seem to be very positive about how 2014 will pan out.
However there will still be a reluctance by the Bankers to write all of the deals that businesses will be requiring. So what will happen in those situations? Where will those clients of yours get their funding? Here are just a couple of comments from our industry:
A February media release from the Debtor & Invoice Finance Association of Australia & New Zealand has advised that the Debtor Finance market witnessed strong growth in the 2013 calendar year.
Their research advised the 3 main benefits given for this growth were:
• The freeing of cash within 48 hours allowing businesses to accelerate growth.
• Utilizing improved cashflow to obtain early settlement discounts from suppliers.
• Reduction in management time spent on chasing slower payers (under a factoring arrangement) allowing more time spent on the business.
The two largest industry segments that make up 55% of the total business are the Wholesale trade 35% and Manufacturing 20%.
The above benefits show that a number of business owners are looking at more than just a set
overdraft limit (which is very helpful). They are looking at a flexible funding facility and the speed of access to those funds together with the most appropriate use of their time. A
traditional Bank Overdraft or Term Loan may not be the only option these days.
After four or five newsletters now where we have tried to provide some useful and relevant business related articles it would be good to hear from you as to what you would like to read about or see included in our future newsletters.
Craig Brown
General Manager Lending