A recent survey conducted by the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) revealed that four out of ten medium-sized companies in Germany are encountering difficulties accessing loans. This figure of 40.5 percent marks a new historical high for the survey series launched in 2017, having increased by 6.5 percentage points compared to the previous quarter.
The barriers to credit access were noted to be particularly stark in the retail sector, where more than half of the companies reported facing restrictions on their ability to secure funding, setting new records for that industry. Similarly, the KfW noted historically high rates of access limitations among SMEs in the manufacturing and service sectors, with 40.8 percent of firms in process industries and 42.4 percent in the service sector reporting challenges.
Despite the rising difficulties in accessing credit, the demand for financing by businesses showed a noticeable decline during the second quarter. The share of small and medium enterprises currently engaged in financing negotiations with banks fell by 1.7 percentage points, settling at 19.3 percent. This represents the lowest reported interest in credit since the fourth quarter of 2023.
