BNP Paribas Leasing Services Spółka z o.o.

Initially, the impact of the epidemic was mainly of organisational importance, as the Company’s management was forced to take quick remedial actions related to the restrictions on the employees’ relocating and the general order to stay at home. All processes have been stabilised in the new work mode, without any negative impact on operational continuity.

However, the events related to the COVID-19 outbreak were negatively reflected in the dynamics of new sales in 2020. The Company was most affected by the problem in the second quarter of 2020, as was the case in the leasing industry as a whole. From the third quarter onwards, the situation very quickly began to improve and finally, in the second half of the year, the realised results of new sales were already slightly different from those achieved in the corresponding period of 2019. Summing up the entire year 2020, the Company concluded almost 15.5 thousand new contracts for the amount of PLN 1,975,034 thousand, which represented a decrease of 15% compared to 2019.

During the economic lockdown (March-May), the possibility to defer instalments for up to 6 months was introduced into the offer for existing customers. The Company, together with the Bank, applied the EBA guidelines in this regard. The impact of exposures with applied moratoria at the peak (June 2020) reached a maximum of 16% of the balance sheet value of the portfolio. By 31 December 2020, all moratoria had been terminated and the negative impact in terms of repayment difficulties among the customers who benefited from this solution is very limited.

Despite the circumstances related to the pandemic, the value of the Company’s assets at the end of 2020 increased by 17% compared to 2019.

Despite the lower than planned value of newly concluded contracts, with the still growing scale of the portfolio, the scale of revenues realised in 2020 was also growing. The value of revenues increased by 19.2% y/y and reached in this period a record level in the history of the Company – PLN 69,040 thousand.

The Company also shows better cost efficiency parameters thanks to the economies of scale it realises.

In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic situation, one of the most significant risk factors was the degree to which customers were meeting their repayment obligations to the Company on time. As a result of the measures taken, such as the aforementioned extension of instalment repayments or the intensification of repayment monitoring and collection activities, the Company even managed to improve the quality of its portfolio compared to 2019, reducing the impact of the pandemic on credit risk costs.

In 2020 the Company recorded a net profit of PLN 4,211 thousand, thus restoring a positive equity balance.