Credit funds eye openings as more banks cut Asia lending
The number of lenders reducing their Asian exposure is seen to be growing fast amid the coronavirus crisis, leaving asset managers keen to fill the financing gap.
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As more European banks – and increasingly also regional ones – further pull back from lending to clients in Asia amid the Covid-19 fallout, private credit managers are ramping up efforts to raise money to provide companies with financing and thereby tap the growing appetite among yield-hungry asset owners.
A growing number of lenders are believed to be reducing or at least re-assessing their Asian exposure, after moves by Dutch firms ABN Amro and ING and Australia’s Westpac to retrench in the region last year. Sources said on condition of anonymity that the likes of Germany’s Commerzbank, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) and Singapore’s UOB were among those paring their activity in foreign markets or reviewing whether they might do so.