Bank lending to small businesses falls £27bn in three years
SME bank lending outstanding across Great Britain has fallen by £26.8bn since 2022, with nine in 10 postcode sectors seeing less finance, analysis shows.
Tuesday 15 September 2026
Financial advice for owners and managers of small and medium sized business SMEs in the UK All your tax, borrowing and administration advice
SME bank lending outstanding across Great Britain has fallen by £26.8bn since 2022, with nine in 10 postcode sectors seeing less finance, analysis shows.
![New buy-to-let company formations are on course to fall for the first time since 2008. Hamptons found 41,483 were set up in the first eight months of the year, against 44,802 a year earlier. Aneisha Beveridge, its head of research, said the incorporation boom was driven by landlords moving properties they already owned into limited companies after the tax changes that began in 2016, and that the trend is reaching its tail end. She added that the Treasury's stamp duty income from those transfers, worth about £1.2bn a year, was likely to start falling. What does a slowdown in landlord incorporations mean for rental supply in your area? Read the full story: [ARTICLE URL] #BuyToLet #Property #Tax](https://bmmagazine.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/shutterstock_390007225-420x236.jpg)
Buy-to-let company formations are on course for their first annual fall since 2008, with 41,483 set up in eight months, analysis by Hamptons shows.
Jefferies analyst Jonathan Pierce says lenders could offer the chancellor a freeze on deferred tax assets to avert a steeper tax rise on 28 October.
The British Business Bank's £210m South East Investment Fund, launched on 9 September, offers loans and equity to smaller firms from Kent to Oxfordshire.
Make UK and Bishop Fleming survey finds inheritance tax changes and energy costs are prompting family-owned manufacturers to consider selling up.
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UK borrowing costs are close to their highest level in almost three decades, with newly issued government debt yielding an average of 3.8 per cent this…
