U.S. companies stepped up equipment borrowing in February, with total activity rising 14.2% compared with the same month a year earlier, the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association reported. The Washington-based trade group, which compiles data covering more than the $1 trillion equipment finance sector, drew its figures from a 25-member survey that included Bank of America and financing units tied to Caterpillar, Dell Technologies, Siemens AG, Canon and Volvo AB.
The association said new loans, leases and lines of credit signed in February amounted to $11 billion on a seasonally adjusted basis. That represents a 4.7% decline from January, indicating a pullback in month-on-month signing activity despite the year-over-year increase.
Small-ticket volume - a commonly cited gauge of equipment demand and broader economic health - rose to $4.4 billion in February. While that figure is 14.7% below January’s level, it remains above the sector’s 12-month trailing average of $3.5 billion.
ELFA’s leadership cautioned that the survey was conducted before two developments that the association said could introduce additional volatility into the first half of the year: the conflict in Iran and the March meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee. The association explicitly stated those events could cause "more bumps in the first half," reflecting uncertainty about near-term market conditions.
Sentiment within the equipment finance industry eased in March. ELFA’s monthly confidence index fell to 61 from 67.6 in February, a move that signals a moderation in industry optimism following recent activity.
The survey’s data show a mixed picture: year-over-year growth in borrowing alongside month-to-month declines in new commitments and in small-ticket volume. The association’s note about timing of the survey underlines that the data do not capture potential impacts from the later developments it referenced.
Readers should treat the reported figures as a snapshot taken before the cited geopolitical and policy events, and interpret the lower confidence reading and monthly declines as indicators of nearer-term uncertainty within the equipment finance sector and related markets.