United Trust Bank (UTB) has announced the launch of its block discounting service which aims to provide funding to non-bank lenders unable to fund their operations through retail consumer deposits.

The new venture headed up by UTB’s Julian Mellors, soft launched in October 2023 and has several live facilities with small and medium sized independent asset finance companies and is in various stages of negotiations with more potential partners.

At present the bank is targeting relationships with asset finance companies funding lease, hire purchase and loan contracts and aims to pay-out facility drawdowns on a same-day service.

Mellors (pictured), head of block discounting at United Trust Bank, said: “Block discounting is a very good funding method for small and medium-sized non-bank finance companies.

“UTB has been considering entering this sector since last year as part of its product and market-diversification strategy, and I was delighted to be selected to lead the creation of this new venture for the bank.

“We have designed our launch offering, which we will develop further over time, to cover most of the requirements of larger and small commercial asset finance lenders.”