Credit Gap Likely to Widen for European Small Businesses

FICO has just completed its survey of European credit risk managers with Efma, and the results show a fairly dismal forecast for the rest of 2012. One of the more disturbing trends reported in our news release is the projected growth in the “credit gap” for small businesses.

While 37% of respondents expect the aggregate amount of credit requested by small businesses to increase, just 16% expect the amount granted by lenders to increase. This is the largest gap seen since the survey began a year ago, beating the previous high recorded in the March report.

Again, the recent economic stimulus approved by the EU economies might not come in time. A bigger stimulus may occur in the UK because of the Olympics.