Corporate finance in the Netherlands - statistics & facts
Banks remain important for company funding in the Netherlands, as can be seen in the growth of outstanding loans from banks to Dutch SMEs since 2017. Bank loans largely focus on real estate mortgages, due to how the domestic housing market is structured. Agriculture and trade companies, however, are the company types with the highest bank loans in the Netherlands. Agricultural companies are likely to apply for bank loans for two reasons. First, they are most likely in need of external financing (due to machinery etc.) and they are actively looking for this, bringing them in easy contact with banks. On the other hand, they often have a mortgage with the same bank already. The use of non-bank financing, or alternative finance, did increase over the years, however. The market size of factoring in the Netherlands, or the sales of company invoices, grew by nearly 15 percent between 2019 and 2018.
