Banks cool on loans to hire firms

摘要

The banks are right not to lend to some UK plant hire companies, according to market report publisher Plimsoll Publishing. After surveying the recent returns from 1,000 plant firms, senior analyst David Pattison found that more than 600 had profit margins of under 1.5 per cent and 452 made a loss. "High-profile failures in other sector such as travel and construction show the danger of operating on micro-profit margins and the same thing could be heading to the plant hire industry in 2011," he says. Even plant owners with minimal or no debt are struggling to get credit if they have thin profit margins, as the banks deem them too risky for a loan.