Interestingly, this leads us on to our final area of enquiry – namely the securitisation of the invoice pool. In the last two to three years, systems have been developed that allow pools of invoice debt (even from multiple companies over multiple geographies) to be transferred to a legally independent vehicle and subsequently issued onto the capital markets as notes or bonds. Because the credit rating of the debt is determined by the rating of the debtor (rather than the company that issued the invoices), this pool can be offered to the capital markets with an A rating, attracting a considerably lower financing cost over alternative refinancing methods.
The technology required to achieve a successful securitisation enables and automates the stringent data entry and reporting standards required by the market regulators. This technology underpins pro-active bad debt/fraud alerts and escalation features, which will emerge as prerequisites the factoring and invoice discounting industry over the next two years, whether or not it is decided to securitise all or part of the nvoice pool. Our survey does indicate a significant ‘early adopter’ community, interested in proceeding with a securitisation transaction, with 20% of factors and invoice discounters expecting to securitise all or at least part of their invoice pool over the next two years.