In the second group, we are seeing a persistent tightening of credit, possibly decreasing in intensity in some countries, with retail bank loan rates that are much higher than those applied by banks located in the first group of countries and more stringent collateral requirements for loans.
The ECB’s recently published “Survey on the access to finance of SMEs in the euro area”1 provides a clear picture of the difficulties this sector, so crucial for the euro area economy, finds itself in. Among the principal causes for concern cited by the SMEs interviewed, access to credit was second only to the difficulties encountered in finding customers for their products.