new business as of August 26, and Dr Roger Gewolb, former CEO of
Park, has left the company.
The decision to stop lending was taken “in light of the continued
poor conditions in the credit markets and uncertain economic
times”, said Maureen Coen, head of European conduit finance at
Credit Suisse, which provided backing for the non-prime motor
finance specialist.
Brokers which included Park Motor Finance on their funding panel
have been told that Park will no longer take on new motor finance
contracts.
It was announced that Gewolb’s minority stake in Park Motor Finance
and its parent company Park Acquisitions Ltd (PAL) has been
acquired by Credit Suisse, meaning PAL is now a wholly-owned
subsidiary of the investment bank.
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Portfolio servicing
Park Motor Finance was acquired by Gewolb, with backing from Credit
Suisse, in early 2006, in order to specialise in motor loans for
non-prime and near-prime applicants.
The current Park Motor Finance portfolio – comprising around 22,000
UK customer accounts – will continue to be serviced, but the future
for the company’s staff is unclear, and Credit Suisse may well
decide to sell the loan portfolio to a third party.
The investment bank declined to comment directly on the future for
Park’s book and its 70 staff, mainly based in Cardiff, saying only:
“Consideration is being given to the appropriate arrangements,
including those necessary to ensure continuity of servicing and the
staffing to support the optimisation of the run-off of the existing
customer loan portfolio.”
Gewolb said in a statement: “I have very much enjoyed working with
Credit Suisse and the Park team and its customers, suppliers and
other business partners over the past two years.
“Despite the significant progress we have been making at
Park, Credit Suisse and I agree the uncertain times in which we
find ourselves do not support the continued origination of new
business.”
Other operators in this area may benefit from the withdrawal of
Park from the non-prime business. Tony Nelson, CEO of rival lender
Private & Commercial Finance Group noted: “Since the news about
Park Motor Finance, we have noticed an upturn in our volume of
finance proposals.”
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