Marc Einsteinium of Chase Auto Finance - Auto Finance Today

Marc Einsteinium of Chase Auto Finance - Auto Finance Today

Sark shined on CEO of chase auto finance talks about how auto finance changed in 2009 and what we might expect to see in 2010.

I think we all feel good about where we are today, versus they think about a year ago, we didn't know the world was coming to an end, and I think many of us didn't think it was going to come to an end. There were a lot of worries out there, and I think the other thing if you think last year this time, people were saying 'Well thanks weren't lending' and 'There was no source of credit', and even though that wasn't totally true. The perception was very strong, so I think that perception is largely gone, I think nobody has any doubts that banks and finance companies are out there landing the capital markets, which created a lot of that credit crunch you heard about last year.

I haven't fully healed but this certainly feels like they're on the mend. so I think you'll see some of the lenders that pulled back dramatically, you know going back and that maybe not as aggressive as they were before, but getting the tipping the TEL back in the water, so you know we had a great year, last year a lot of it, because our balance sheet was strong, our funding was still strong, we had capital behind us to basically do the lending, and so we picked up a lot of shares because our competitors were pulling back.

So we were in the no illusion of continuing that large share we had last year, we think we know competitors are going to come back in, so I think from a deal, a bit perspective they know that's going to be a healthier environment for everybody.

The one thing that's very unique about the auto finance space is I don't think that, I mean in general there were a lot of players who got hit pretty hard by the credit cycle, both in terms of no funding and sums of losses in delinquency, but it's relatively speaking, we think about what happened in mortgage, what's happening in the credit card, I think that we've come through this as an industry relatively unscathed.

I think when you look at the consumer and the credit cycle, many of us are seeing some in terms of consumer delinquency and losses. So first my perspective is we're going to have some good tailwinds as we go into 2010, that we're seeing the consumer have pulled back, they've been very cautious, the people who are out there shopping last year, ten of the people who had money, we saw more down payments, that's all good and healthy for the industry.

That's going to be good and healthy for all portfolios and to allow all of us to stay out there, and lend and be very supportive of the dealer base.