The delay has found its buyer – Newspaper Kommersant No. 64 (7509) dated 04/13/2023

In January-March, banks significantly increased both the overdue debts put up for sale on online platforms and the share of sold lots. The market is growing against the backdrop of a recovery in the purchasing power of collectors, as well as the desire of banks to sell problem loans. In addition, in 2022, creditors issued more short-term products, which means that by the end of 2023 they will become overdue, which will also lead to an increase in the volume of the cession market.

According to the results of the first quarter of 2023, banks issued 202.2 thousand overdue loans for the amount of RUB 32.6 billion on online platforms for the sale of overdue debts.

Despite the fact that in quantitative terms there was a decrease of almost 8% compared to last year, in monetary terms the volume increased by 6.5%, follows from the data of the Debex online auction, which Kommersant has read.

In total, about 80% of the debts transferred by creditors for collection under the cession scheme are sold through such platforms, when the overdue debt is redeemed from the creditor. At the same time, a noticeable increase in the share of completed transactions was recorded: in the first quarter of 2022, both in terms of their number and in terms of the volume of repurchased debts, the indicator was slightly above 70%, at the end of the reporting period it rose to 90%.

Among the debts offered to collectors for purchase at online auctions in the first three months of this year, the share of delinquency on those debts that were issued during the pandemic in 2020-2021 increased. Thus, they accounted for 24% (an increase of 5 p.p. YoY) of the total supply and 32% (+17 p.p.) of the number of transactions, follows from Debex materials. The same dynamics in two or three years should be expected with respect to the debts of the current period.

“The policy of banks implies, in general, that the sale of debts is carried out on average after two years of being in arrears. During the unprecedented period of the pandemic, borrowers almost simultaneously went into arrears and right now, after three years, these loans go to collection agencies,” explains Evgeny Senkovsky, director of the department for working with overdue debts of Rosbank. Crisis periods may affect the growth of overdue debts in a big way, agrees the president of SRO NAPCA Elman Mehdiyev. But first, problem debt must go through the stage of restructuring, credit holidays and agency collection, he recalls. In general, in the market, the average age of delinquency for a banking portfolio is 500-1000 days, for MFO portfolios – 200 days.

There is a demand for purchase, as there is a supply, bankers note.

“We expect prices for consumer loans and credit cards to trade around 8% this year against 6.5% a year ago,” notes Mr. Senkovsky. By mid-April, transactions to purchase bank debts are closed at a price of 9.5-11% of the amount of debt, Alexander Vasiliev, CEO of ID Collect, cites data. “The buying activity of market participants has recovered: during the period of downtime in 2022, they accumulated a significant amount of free funds, and now these investments have rocked the price tags,” he said. However, not all participants in the collection market are optimistic: the projected price level is slightly higher than 6%, which is 3 percentage points lower than in 2022, says PKB Managing Director Pavel Mikhmel.

Over the course of the year, delinquency offers on the market will continue to grow, Debex is sure. Moreover, last year there was growth in the credit card segment. This should form the corresponding portfolios by the end of this year, says Sasha Danilov, CEO of the online platform. This is confirmed by interviewed collectors. By the end of 2023, the volume of supply in the cession market will increase by 10%, to 297 billion rubles, the volume of closed transactions – by 19%, to 249 billion rubles, predicts Pavel Mikhmel. In addition, banks will offer the market younger debt, which will also affect the supply of overdue loans. Last year, explains Denis Belkin, head of the Debt Market ETP, sellers held on to “young” debts due to an uncertain financial situation and sold more “old” ones, less promising for collection.

Polina Trifonova