WFY’26: Austria’s factoring market grows 3.5% to €37.5bn despite weak economy

Austria’s factoring market continued to expand in 2025 despite a fragile economic recovery, weak industrial conditions and persistent pressure from energy costs and geopolitical uncertainty. In this country report, Thomas Strahlhofer, CEO of FactorBank Aktiengesellschaft, examines how receivables finance is helping Austrian companies protect liquidity, manage credit risk and navigate a more challenging operating environment.

The article included in the World Factoring Yearbook 2026 (WFY’26) explores a market where total factoring volume reached €37.51bn in 2025, with international business continuing to account for the larger share of activity. It also considers the dominance of non-recourse structures, growing use of digital tools, supply chain resilience and the increasing role of reverse factoring in working-capital management.

Below is an excerpt from his article.

Although the economic environment was difficult in 2025, Austrian factoring institutions withstood the adverse conditions and factored a total volume of EUR 37.51bn. This is an increase year on year of EUR 1.30bn and a growth rate of 3.5 per cent. Building on this performance, the industry showed that, even in a challenging macroeconomic setting, factoring remains a resilient and strategically relevant financing instrument for corporates.

In 2025, the penetration of factoring volume relative to GDP in Austria amounted to 7.2 per cent and was only slightly below that of 2024. The total factoring market is split into EUR 21.28bn international and EUR 16.22bn domestic business and aligns with Austria’s export driven economy. Both segments experienced meaningful growth, with international volumes rising 3.8 per cent and domestic volumes 3 per cent respectively, reaffirming robust liquidity needs across Austrian supply chains.

Non recourse factoring remained the predominant factoring type, representing EUR 27.63bn – approximately 73.7 per cent of the total factoring volume – reflecting the importance of credit risk transfer among Austrian exporters operating in highly integrated European value chains. Recourse factoring continued to be at a much lower level with a slight expansion from EUR 9.40bn in 2024 to EUR 9.9bn in 2025. The national client profile is dominated by SMEs and mid sized industrial companies. Austrian SMEs remain active users of factoring.

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