Within the framework of the “SME Outlook” research, since January 2005 the HCCI Institute for Economic and Enterprise Research (IEER) conducts a quarterly analysis of the situation of small and medium sized enterprises, their short-term prospects, as well as the economic and institutional factors affecting this business group. For this project a total of 300 companies operating within the fields of manufacturing, construction and services are surveyed and the data is analysed in every quarter. The structure of the sample remains the same from quarter to quarter, with the companies surveyed representing the economic performance and sector distribution of small and medium sized enterprises in Hungary.

On June 1, 2013, the National Bank of Hungary launched the Loans for Growth Program (NHP), albeit the details of the program had been known several months earlier. For the October 2014 SME Outlook survey the leaders of small and medium-sized enterprises were asked about bank loans and the NHP Program by the IEER.

The results show that 56% of small and medium-sized enterprises have some form of bank loan. The most common type of credit is working capital loan (including bank loans). Companies hold mostly forint-denominated loans.

Euro-based loan is the most common foreign currency loan and mainly used by export-oriented companies, companies in the manufacturing sector and medium-sized firms.

Every fifth company among SMEs have applied for loan under the Loans for Growth Program (NHP). More than half of the companies were interested in working capital loans. Every second company applied for a loan up to 50 million forints. The overall opinion of SMEs is that there are no major changes in the terms of access to loans during the period 2013 and 2014.