BBA reveals “below-trend” lending figures

The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has released the latest figures collected from the major British banking groups for September, revealing that total sterling lending to the UK private sector showed a net underlying increase of £10 billion, to reach £1,261 billion.

This is down on the underlying rise of £14.6 billion that took place in August and below the £15.4 billion average that has been recorded over the past six months.

Net mortgage lending experienced an increase of £5.4 billion – down on the £5.9 billion growth that took place in August and slightly below the £5.6 billion six-month average.

Unsecured personal lending was marginally down in September, with credit card borrowing falling by £0.1 billion while loans and overdrafts increased by the same amount.

David Dooks, director of statistics for the BBA, said: "It is not unusual for an above-trend net mortgage lending figure, as we saw in August, to be followed by a below-trend figure, as in September.

"This year’s noticeable weakness in consumer credit continued in September with a negligible rise in personal loans and overdrafts whilst credit card lending declined again.  So far this year, borrowing on credit cards issued by the major banks has contracted substantially, by £1.4 billion."