Nassau Asset Management reported a 45 percent increase in the volume of truck repossessions when comparing the first quarter of 2005 to the same quarter of 2004, but cautioned against declaring a trend.
This was the first quarter since 2002 that Nassau saw a significant increase in repossessions and liquidations, said Edward Castagna, senior executive vice president of the New York asset management company.
“It’s too early to call this a trend, but Q1 is the first time in a long time that repossession and liquidation activity increased for most sectors,” Castagna said. “We are monitoring the situation to see if our statistics reflect deeper economic issues.”
Other types of equipment saw a much steeper increase in repossessions. For example, repossession of medical devices increased 258 percent, personal computers 79 percent. .
On the other hand, repossessions of construction equipment increased only 13 percent, while repossessions of machine tools actually decreased 44 percent.
Higher fuel prices, higher insurance premiums and an overall economic slowdown may have contributed to the spike in truck repossessions, Nassau said.
Also, an increase in lending by Nassau’s clients may have resulted, inevitably, in more leases and loans subject to default this year.
