Consumer credit surpasses the four billion euros’ threshold this year
In the first eight months of the year, the Portuguese have requested a total of 4,276 million euros in consumer credit. In August, the total was 563.5 million euros.
Consumer credit continues increasing. In August, banks and credit institutions lent a total of 563.5 million euros in consumer credit, states the Bank of Portugal this Monday. This amount makes it possible to elevate to more than four billion euros the amount of financing for that purpose made available for the entire year.
According to the data gathered from the entity headed by Carlos Costa, in the first eight months of the year, the Portuguese requested a total of 4,276 million euros in consumer credit. This is the highest amount in the Bank of Portugal’s history, which goes back to the beginning of 2013; the financing amount available between January and August of this year surpasses the amount from that year, which was 3,704 million euros.
In comparison to the first eight months of last year, the amount of consumer credit granted this year represents a 12.88% growth. The increase in credit-granting is cross-sectional to all credit purposes, but especially on car credit, non-specified loans, home and vacation loans, for example, in which there was a larger increase.
In the first eight months of the year, the Portuguese have requested a total of 1,784 million euros in car loans and 1,784 million euros in loans for unspecified purposes. This means that it was 22.48% and 9.09% above the same period of 2016, respectively. Together, both these purposes represent 83% of the total amount of consumer credit lent in the first eight months of the year.
As for the category including credit cards, credit lines, current banking accounts and overdraft facilities, they saw credit granting ascend to almost 657 million euros between January and August, 13% above what had been registered last year. As for personal credit for education, health, renewable energies and leasing of equipment increased 21.27% this year. However, this is a low representation of the full picture: this year it ascended to 34.3 million euros, 0.8% of the total consumer credit granted in the first eight months of the year.
