Twenty years in business means twenty years of watching the world of business finance change around us. We’ve navigated financial crises, a global pandemic, seismic shifts in the lending landscape and everything in between. All while helping UK businesses secure the funding they need to grow.
To mark our 20th anniversary, we thought it would be fun to put your business finance knowledge to the test. Below are five key moments from the past two decades of UK business finance history. Your challenge? Guess the year each one happened.
No Googling. No peeking. Just have a go and see how well you know your business finance history.
Question 1: The big freeze
The UK government launched an emergency scheme giving businesses access to government-backed loans of up to £5 million, with no repayments required for the first twelve months. It was one of the most significant interventions in business lending in modern history and within weeks, thousands of UK businesses had applied. Lenders were inundated. Brokers like us worked around the clock to help clients navigate the process.
What year did this happen?
Question 2: The crash that changed everything
The global financial crisis hit UK businesses hard. Credit dried up almost overnight. Banks that had been lending freely suddenly pulled back and many businesses that had relied on traditional high street lenders found themselves without access to the funding they needed. It was the moment that independent finance brokers became more important than ever and it’s a period that fundamentally shaped how UK business lending works today.
What year did the crisis peak in the UK?
Question 3: A new way to borrow
The UK’s first dedicated peer-to-peer business lending platform launched, offering an entirely new route to finance for small and medium-sized businesses outside the traditional banking system. It was a watershed moment for alternative finance and the beginning of a much more diverse lending landscape for UK businesses. Today, alternative lenders make up a significant portion of the market, something that simply wasn’t the case when NGI started out.
What year did this launch?
Question 4: The bounce back
The UK government introduced a new, simplified loan scheme specifically designed for smaller businesses. It offered loans of up to £50,000 with a 100% government guarantee and a famously straightforward application process. Within 24 hours of the scheme opening, over 100,000 applications had been submitted. It became one of the most widely used business finance initiatives the UK has ever seen.
What year was this scheme introduced?
Question 5: The rate shock
After more than a decade of historically low interest rates, the Bank of England began a rapid series of base rate increases that had a significant impact on business borrowing costs across the UK. For many business owners, it was the first time they had experienced meaningful rate rises during their time running a business and it made the case for reviewing finance arrangements more important than ever.
What year did the Bank of England begin this cycle of rate rises?
The Answers
Ready? Here’s how you got on.
Question 1: 2020 — The Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) launched in March 2020 as the pandemic took hold. It was one of the most significant moments in UK business finance in a generation and one we were very much in the middle of, helping clients access support at an incredibly pressured time.
Question 2: 2008 — The global financial crisis reached its peak in the UK in 2008, with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September of that year sending shockwaves through the global economy. The aftermath reshaped business lending for years to come.
Question 3: 2010 — Funding Circle, the UK’s first peer-to-peer business lending platform, launched in 2010. It was a pivotal moment for alternative finance and helped open the door to a much broader range of lending options for UK SMEs. NGI Finance has been a proud Funding Circle Business Champion, something we’re genuinely pleased to be recognised for.
Question 4: 2020 — The Bounce Back Loan Scheme (BBLS) launched in May 2020, just weeks after CBILS, specifically to provide faster, simpler support to the UK’s smallest businesses. The speed and scale of uptake was remarkable.
Question 5: 2021/2022 — The Bank of England began raising rates in December 2021, starting a cycle that continued through 2022 and into 2023, taking the base rate from a historic low of 0.1% to levels not seen for well over a decade. For businesses with variable rate borrowing, it was a significant shift.
How Did You Score?
- 5 out of 5 — Impressive. You clearly keep a close eye on the world of business finance. Have you considered a career as a broker?
- 3 or 4 — Solid knowledge. You know your way around the landscape, even if one or two dates caught you out.
- 1 or 2 — Don’t worry. Knowing the dates is less important than knowing where to turn when you need the right finance at the right time. That’s what we’re here for.
- 0 out of 5 — Respect for the honesty. The good news is that navigating business finance is exactly what we’ve spent the past 20 years doing, so you don’t have to do it alone.
Twenty years on, the business finance landscape looks very different from when Maria founded NGI back in 2006. The lenders have changed, the products have evolved and the world has thrown more than a few curveballs along the way. But the fundamentals remain the same, businesses need access to the right funding, at the right time, with the right advice behind them.
That’s what we’ve always done and what we’ll keep doing for the next 20 years.
If you’d like to talk through your business finance options, give us a call on 01993 706403 or email enquiries@ngifinance.co.uk. We’d love to hear from you.
