BBBI profits soar thanks to P2P and SME investments

BRITISH Business Bank Investments (BBBI), the commercial arm of the national economic development bank, tripled its profits last year to £40m.

The government-backed bank, which lends to a number of peer-to-peer platforms, supported 12,068 businesses across the UK as of 31 March 2016. It invested £0.7bn alongside £4.6bn of private sector capital across 34 business finance providers.

“In the year to March 2016, BBBI has delivered on its return objective and, at the same time, has unlocked an increased supply of finance to UK small businesses,” said chairman Keith Morgan.

“Across our 34 portfolio investments we have supported a diversity of providers including leaders in the alternative finance industry, challenger banks and private debt funds. This is in addition to traditional direct lenders and asset finance providers…These annual results show a year of strong growth and significant momentum.”

BBBI has invested £48m through technology-enabled and P2P firms, which has been invested across 8,466 businesses as of 31 March 2016. It has committed £95m across the sector in total.

“This sector continues to evolve rapidly as business models develop and products are adopted by the market,” said the company in its annual report.

“We continue to follow these developments closely, to ensure a strong alignment with our own objectives.”

Funding Circle, MarketInvoice and RateSetter have all received funding through the BBBI.

“Looking forward, we continue to engage with the market in order to consider other opportunities in which BBBI may wish to participate,” said the state-backed bank.

“The platforms we have supported continued to mature during the year and are providing valuable lending to an increasing number of small- and medium- sized enterprises.”