Despite the economic turmoil, French firms
saw the volume of overall financing rise in 2008, according to the
Association Française des Sociétés Financières (ASF), the French
finance and leasing association.

Including vehicles, French banks and lessors
financed €27.2 billion of assets in 2008, compared with €26.3
billion in 2007 – an increase of 3.4 percent year-on-year. This was
not reflected in the number of contracts, however, as these fell by
2.2 percent year-on-year, to just above one million contracts.

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Of the total volume financed, the finance
lease market fared the best, growing by 5.2 percent year-on-year,
to reach €12.6 billion.

Commercial vehicles formed the bulk of finance
leases, with €5.2 billion worth of finance. The IT market grew the
most, however, seeing a year-on-year rise of 15.7 percent, to €579
million.

This contrasted with the operating lease
market, where demand for IT equipment fell by 9.7 percent, down to
€1.4 billion from €1.6 billion the previous year.

In total, the operating lease market shrunk by
0.7 percent, from €10.25 billion in 2007 to €10.17 billion in 2008.
Office equipment was the worst hit, however, falling by 15.5
percent to €2.3 billion.

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Factoring companies had a much more profitable
year, seeing business rise by nearly 15 percent year-on-year, to
€134.1 billion.

Cross-border factoring operations saw the
highest growth, of 29 percent year-on-year, to €18.9 billion, while
domestic operations totalled €115.3 billion – a 12.3 percent
growth.

“Thanks to the intrinsic solidity of French
banking structures, as well as the government’s determined support,
France has avoided the worst challenge to its banking and financing
system thus far,” said Francois Lemasson, president of the ASF.

“Calm has slowly returned to our funding
channels, and there is some relief that the risk of a major
disruption in the financial supply chain has distanced itself
slightly.”

Jason T Hesse