Ionuț Morar, CEO of BT Leasing, for ZF Live: BT Leasing's plan is based on two pillars, organic growth and growth through acquisitions

Ionuț Morar, CEO of BT Leasing, was the guest of the ZF Live program, where he talked about the potential of the leasing market in Romania, as well as about the company's strategic development directions.

BT Leasing reaches 43,000 financed customers

• The balance of BT Leasing's financing reached €1.3 billion, representing 43,000 financed customers.
  
  
• From the BT Leasing strategy perspective, the growth plan is based on two pillars, organic growth and growth through mergers and acquisitions. We want to be an important player in the Romanian economy. Whenever an opportunity arises we will analyze it. There are always opportunities in the market.

The leasing market in Romania, still very high potential

• The leasing market in Romania still has great potential, given that it currently stands at 2% of GDP, while in other European countries it has reached 5-6% of GDP.
  
  
• Although the leasing market is now at €5 billion, similar to 2007 when leasing was at its peak, entrepreneurs have now reached a level of maturity which means they will start to turn to better financing instruments.
  
  
• The economy is largely made up of small and medium-sized firms. The more you evolve in a market, the more mature you are, the more you turn to better financing instruments, such as leasing, credit, stock exchange or try to understand that there are other financing options that are more suitable for your need. The need for finance probably wasn't that great. There were other sources of funding from suppliers, trade credit and the maturity of the entrepreneurs was not. Now we are starting to think in plans, longer term, have growth strategies, formalize those strategies. There is a huge potential in Romania to increase the degree of financial intermediation, but somehow the regulations should also come in this direction, to better understand certain financial instruments.
  
  
• Entrepreneurs have a fairly high degree of economic literacy, in the sense that they differentiate between personal investments and investments for the company. When they decide to make the investment they have a well-defined plan to return the asset or know what they want to do with it, either pay for it or replace it. Most of them follow through with their lease.
  
  
• On the other hand, when there are problems in the economic environment and they can no longer repay, some people say from the outset that they can no longer repay and want to close the relationship amicably, others want support for a certain period of time until they get their cash back.
  
  
• As far as the market is concerned, there is a slight delay in the plans that entrepreneurs have. Uncertainty always makes you more cautious and postpone certain investment plans, but as an entrepreneur, you can never stand still. You always have to be on the move, looking for solutions. I really believe that entrepreneurs will diversify their financing solutions and adapt them to their needs. I don't think the tax package will be an impact that will be passed on to leasing companies. Certainly they will be affected by the tax increase, it's about increasing costs, but we have been through this before.
  
  
• I think we are at a much more mature stage than we were in 2008-2009, when we were working with triple-digit interest rates. Entrepreneurs have their plans, they have to stick to their plans, keep moving, keep investing.