The P2P lenders offering CBILS finance with one month until application deadline
Firms have just over one month left to apply for finance under the coronavirus business interruption loan scheme (CBILS), here are the peer-to-peer and marketplace lenders offering finance under the scheme…
There was criticism of the scheme in the early days as the British Business Bank was accused of being slow to approve alternative platforms, but out of 104 accredited lenders, there are now four P2P lending platforms offering CBILS.
These are Funding Circle, Assetz Capital, LendingCrowd and Folk2Folk.
There are also other marketplace lenders such as MarketFinance and ThinCats.
The list includes the main banking brands such as HSBC, Barclays, RBS and Santander but the rest is also made up of non-bank and alternative lenders such as Nucleus Commercial Finance, iwoca and Ebury.
Read more: What CBILS deals are alternative lenders offering?
CBILS was launched in April and lets small- and medium-sized businesses apply for loans and other kinds of finance worth up to £5m.
The government guarantees 80 per cent of the finance to the lender and pays interest and any fees for the first 12 months.
Accredited lenders are approved by the British Business Bank and set their own rates.
Business borrowers must get their applications in by the end of September and lenders have two months from then to consider and provide loans.
An alternative is the bounce back loans (BBL) scheme, which runs until 4 November.
Businesses can borrow up to £50,000 with 100 per cent guaranteed by the government.
The loans are interest-free for the first year and 2.5 per cent after that.
Of the 27 BBL accredited lenders, Funding Circle is the only peer-to-peer or marketplace lender but several others could be classed as alternatives such as Starling Bank, Tide, Conister and Capital on Tap.
The rest is made up of mainstream banking brands.
More than 1.23m businesses have accessed these schemes so far, but as Funding Circle warns, time is running out to make an application.
