Estima Finance to expand to high potential areas

The general manager of Estima Finance says the consumer lending company is going to expand in retail sectors. It is targeting areas, which have a considerable growth potential, such as IT, furniture and home decor, after it increased its share capital by about 4 million dollars (above 3.2 million euros), to around 9 million dollars.

“At this moment, Estima Finance is operating on a very well-defined section of the consumer lending market, namely that of loans that are directly contracted from stores. On this segment, the company reached a market share estimated at 10% in 2005. For 2006, we plan to gain a 13% market share,” stated Mihnea Mocanu, chief executive of Estima Finance.

He says Estima Finance”s services reached as far as 700 commercial locations last year, and the total volume of granted loans advanced 4.3 times in 2005 compared with 2004.

Amid the development of the company”s financing resources, the volume of loans granted on the company”s own account surged 6.5 times.

“We plan to expand the product range in order to add some new customer segments. This month, the company will launch a credit card bringing bonuses for payments made directly with the card, zero interest rates and flexible reimbursement,” Mocanu also said Retail lending in Romania stands at a much lower level compared with neighbouring countries such as Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, shows a recent NBR survey.

The weight of retail lending in the GDP in 2005 amounted to 5.5%, one percentage point higher than in the previous year. By comparison, in Hungary, the weight stands at 13.1% and in Poland at 11.2%. laura.laurentiu@zf.ro