NEWS: 23 NOVEMBER 2015
THE RISE OF ALTERNATIVE FINANCE - HOW THE BANK REFERRAL SCHEME COULD IMPACT SME'S & FUNDERS
Last week the Davenham Trade Finance team attended an incredibly insightful seminar on ‘The Rise of Alternative Finance’. The morning saw guest speakers Dr. Louise Beaumont of GLI Finance Ltd & Conrad Ford of Funding Options discuss a number of issues and key points within the industry that commonly affect alternative finance.
Something we will be looking out for is the white paper due to be published by Funding Options in the next few weeks, focussing on the reduction in traditional funding for SME’s such as bank overdrafts being continually reduced or even pulled completely; in addition to the need for many SME’s to be funded via personal credit cards – something that wouldn’t be necessary should the availability of alternative routes be made clearer to business owners.
With this in mind, a topic of interest was the up and coming bank referral scheme, whereby all bank declines will be redirected to an alternative finance provider, something we predict will make a huge contribution to bridging the funding gap. The scheme was passed by the House earlier this year and has seen a great deal of support from the Chambers of Commerce, and is now going through due diligence, with a proposed launch of early 2016, something many of us in the room were hoping for. Once the scheme is implemented, it should open up numerous opportunities for small and medium sized businesses across the UK to access alternative forms of finance directly from the most suitable providers for them; something they may previously have been oblivious to without the scheme.
We thoroughly enjoyed the event, and the company of many like minded individuals who shared their knowledge and opinions on upcoming changes to the system that could impact alternative finance in a massively positive way.
To learn more about the bank referral scheme click here, and watch this space for the Funding Options white paper, it’s sure to be an interesting read.
Something we will be looking out for is the white paper due to be published by Funding Options in the next few weeks, focussing on the reduction in traditional funding for SME’s such as bank overdrafts being continually reduced or even pulled completely; in addition to the need for many SME’s to be funded via personal credit cards – something that wouldn’t be necessary should the availability of alternative routes be made clearer to business owners.
With this in mind, a topic of interest was the up and coming bank referral scheme, whereby all bank declines will be redirected to an alternative finance provider, something we predict will make a huge contribution to bridging the funding gap. The scheme was passed by the House earlier this year and has seen a great deal of support from the Chambers of Commerce, and is now going through due diligence, with a proposed launch of early 2016, something many of us in the room were hoping for. Once the scheme is implemented, it should open up numerous opportunities for small and medium sized businesses across the UK to access alternative forms of finance directly from the most suitable providers for them; something they may previously have been oblivious to without the scheme.
We thoroughly enjoyed the event, and the company of many like minded individuals who shared their knowledge and opinions on upcoming changes to the system that could impact alternative finance in a massively positive way.
To learn more about the bank referral scheme click here, and watch this space for the Funding Options white paper, it’s sure to be an interesting read.
