Trends in the markets for financial services

We anticipate that automotive financial services will prove highly important to global vehicle sales in 2023. The continuing shortages of intermediates and commodities may generate uncertainty, exacerbated by the consequences of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Furthermore, the increased interest rates will put pressure on the demand for financial services. We expect demand to rise in emerging markets where market penetration has so far been low. Regions with already established automotive financial services markets will probably see a continuation of the trend towards enabling mobility at the lowest possible total cost. Integrated end-to-end solutions, which include mobility-related service modules such as insurance and innovative packages of services, are likely to become increasingly important for this. Additionally, we expect that demand will increase for new forms of mobility, such as rental and car subscription (Auto-Abo) services, and for integrated mobility services, for example parking, refueling and charging, and that the shift initiated in the European financial services business with individual customers from financing to lease contracts will continue. Especially in the Chinese market, we anticipate an increase in the importance of direct business between manufacturers and customers. The seamless integration of financial services into the online vehicle offering will take on increasing importance in efforts to promote this type of business. We estimate that this trend will also persist in the years 2024 to 2027.

In the mid-sized and heavy commercial vehicles category, we anticipate rising demand for financial services products in emerging markets. In these countries in particular, financing solutions support vehicle sales and are thus an essential component of the sales process. In the developed markets, we expect to see increased demand for telematics services and services aimed at reducing total cost of ownership in 2023. This trend is also expected to persist in the period 2024 to 2027.