The annual pre-tax loss of more than £147 million has been a significant blow to the UK Government-owned British Business Bank. The bank said that the market valuations of some of the companies it invested in, particularly in the technology sector, were influenced by a drop in the market valuations. Chief executive Louis Taylor argues taxpayers have not lost any money and the loss was expected after the group increased its investments in recent years. The development lender has made a commitment of £1.6bn to funding agreements over the past year, he said.
The bank's investment value dropped by five percent, down £146 million from the end of March. The bank's value increased in the year before, when it saw the value of its investments increase to £619 million. The bank has deposited an average of £12.4 billion in more than 90,000 businesses, which does not include loans it gave out to victims of coronavirus.
The state-owned group manages the government's three pandemic loan programs and the Future Fund, which are now closed to applications. In its offer is the Start Up Loans program, which reached £1 billion in lending last year. In addition, more than half of these investments went to small firms run by women and people from ethnic minorities.