LONDON (Reuters) - State-backed bank NatWest Group (L:NWG) tapped 5 billion pounds from a Bank of England fund set up to support lending to struggling small businesses in the pandemic, BoE data on Thursday showed.
NatWest has been the biggest user of the so-called 'TFSME' scheme so far, which has extended 14.3 billion pounds of cheap funding to lenders near the rock bottom BoE interest rate of 0.1%.
Nationwide Building Society drew down the second largest amount, at 3.2 billion pounds, followed by Santander (MC:SAN)'s UK unit at 2.5 billion pounds.
Relative minnow the Coventry Building Society has drawn 1.5 billion pounds from the scheme, while Britain's biggest domestic bank Lloyds (LON:LLOY) has drawn only 1 billion pounds so far.
The TFSME scheme was launched in April by the BoE in anticipation of financial pressure on banks due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It followed an earlier TFS scheme launched after the UK's Brexit referendum, also designed to boost cheap lending.