As of today, June 2nd 2020, figures from the British Business Bank reveal the popularity of the Bounce Back Loan scheme, with 699,354 cumulative approved facilities with a cumulative approved value of £21.29billion; to me that looks like an average loan size of just over £30k.
The cumulative value of approved loans under the CoronaVirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) is £8.92 billion representing 45,843 facilities, suggesting an average loan size of just short of £200k
Add the CoronaVirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme where £1.1billion is the cumulative approved amount, across 191 approvals and nearly three quarters of a million businesses have benefitted from over £31billion in loans.
The numbers are remarkable but there is worry in the banking community, specifically relating to the Bounce Back Scheme with some suggesting around half of them will never see any repayments at all.
The implications 12 months hence could be significant, for government in underwriting the loans, for banks, if government don’t honour guarantee and for borrowers if repayment falls back to them.