Happy days for British
brokers
Life is improving for embattled British
brokers. Not only is Barclays Asset & Sales Finance rumoured to
have recently doubled its previously mauled broker panel from two
to four brokers, Santander is also expected to become a source of
financing for Britain’s hard-up lease intermediaries.
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Although Santander, to date, has invested most
of its efforts in vehicle finance and only dabbled in asset
finance, the arrival last month of Mike Oxby as head of asset
finance at the Spanish bank, combined with a press announcement
that it plans to ramp-up leasing, can only mean good news for
brokers.
Furthermore, Oxby’s old chum from his Key
Equipment Finance days, Chris Hardwick, who joined Santander late
last year, is said to be not averse to the broker model, although
one intermediary did let slip last month that he expects Santander
deals to be limited, at least initially, to circa £250,000 a
piece.
Shire hire
The word on the street is that, despite having
been on the receiving end of some non-positive public scrutiny of
late, Shire Leasing has still been receiving CVs from staff of
other companies desperate to join its merry band of leasing
folk.
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By GlobalDataAlthough it is not clear whether Shire is
actively recruiting staff, it is understood that at least one of
its relatively recent arrivals came from Siemens Financial
Services’ UK company.
This is not entirely unsurprising given the
amount of business SFS and Shire have shared over the years. Not
all of this has necessarily been great business, however.
The broker forwarded scores of telecoms deals linked to BC Telecom, many of which were financed by SFS.
Numerous customers of this telecoms supplier,
which is currently the subject of an investigation by trading
standards, have also stopped paying their lease rentals claiming,
er, they were the victims of false inducements.
HSBC off-shores up its leasing
business
All change at HSBC’s leasing business,
although the full story of what is going on here is less obvious
than what first meets the eye.
What is well-known is that last month HSBC
Asset Finance decided to close its vehicle finance arm to new
business. This followed a decision by both HSBC and Lloyds Banking
Group – the owner of Lex, which has a referral agreement with HSBC
Vehicle Finance dating back to 2005 – that vehicles were not making
them enough money. The plan now is for the vehicle arm’s existing
customers to be migrated to Lex Autolease.
Less well-known is that, yet again, HSBC Rail
is up for sale. There is always secrecy around these deals,
although usually rumours tend to get an airing in the national
media (which love rail finance stories). This time around, however,
only a few trade mags have picked up on the story, which centres on
rumours that several infrastructure funds are looking to buy the
rosco.
Even less well-known is that HSBC Rail, whose
UK parent is HSBC Bank plc and holding company is Forward Trust
Rail Services Ltd, is also linked to a Dublin- registered
undertaking called European Rail Finance Limited (ERFL).
In fact, according to one report seen by
Leasing Life, this “arm’s length” (read: offshore) entity paid £1.8
billion (€2.1 billion) for property, plant and equipment owned by
HSBC, along with the UK bank’s “operating lease back for the
duration of the company’s existing leases with its customers”.
Shortly after this transaction with ERFL was
completed, HSBC was put up for sale. Then the recession came, so it
was taken off the market, but now it is back on again.
A cruising loss
It has been a great year for luxury liner
leasing – not. According to Plimsoll, the research organisation
which recently published a report on the financial performance of
444 leasing companies, Stena Voyager Ltd, the special purpose
vehicle which owns and leases the Irish Sea ferry of that name, is
the sixth most profitable lessor in Britain. Last year, Plimsoll
reported, its gross profits totalled £3.07 million (€3.5
million).
All this, however, becomes less impressive
when one considers the fact that last year was the first year the
company got round to publicly reporting its gross profits since its
formation almost a decade ago. Also, even less impressive is that,
buried away in the small print lies the stark fact that its debts
total a whopping 1,702 percent of total sales. Choppy waters
indeed.
Quiz time
Which well-known British leasing sales
director uses the code name ‘Snakey’ when communicating with one of
his less salubrious suppliers? Answers to the editor please.
