Coronavirus loans: UK companies borrow £38.4bn to survive lockdown
British companies have borrowed £38.4bn under the government’s three emergency credit programmes since the coronavirus pandemic struck.
However, the approval rate for coronavirus business interruption loans (CBILS) remains just over half, with 51 per cent of the loans being allowed.
Meanwhile, the bounce back loan scheme, which supports small businesses with 100 per cent state-backed loans, has continued to see the strongest demand of all the government’s emergency schemes introduced to help businesses fight the pandemic.
Lending under the bounce back scheme rose to £26.34bn by 14 June, up from £23.8bn the previous week.
A total of 863,584 small businesses have received bounce back loans from UK lenders.
The bounce back scheme allows small businesses to receive a loan worth a quarter of their turnover within as little as 24 hours, with the value capped at £50,000.
The approval rate for these loans remains just above 81.7 per cent.
However, the approval rate for CBILS remains significantly lower, at 51 per cent.
Of the 96,492 companies that applied for a loan under the scheme, just 49,247 were approved. The figure marks an increase of just under 1,600 businesses being accepted for the scheme over the past week, with a total of £10.1bn having been lent to companies under the scheme.
The CBILS scheme carries an 80 per cent government guarantee.
Applications for the Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS) continued to have the lowest approval rate of any of the government-backed loans at 42 per cent.
Some 661 larger businesses have applied for loans under the scheme, but just 279 of those applications have been approved.
A total of £1.77bn has so far been lent out under CLBILS, an increase of £200m on the previous week.
This marks a smaller increase versus the week before that, when CLBILS borrowing increased by about £500m.