The conference session took an initial look at funding options for new and established companies wanting to start or scale up their own portfolio of finance agreements.

The panel, which comprised a selection of experts from the funding market, highlighted some of the different funding approaches and speciality financing options available, including medium-term notes, block discounting, invoice discounting, and the British Business Bank’s ENABLE programmes.

The key points raised in the conference panel discussion included:

• Providing funds to lenders is a multi-faceted market
• A wide range of funding sources exists, from block discounting through medium-term notes to the British Business Bank’s ENABLE programmes
• Openness and transparency are key to building trusting relationships between borrowers and lenders

Mark Picken, CEO of Shire Leasing provided an insight into the different funding options utilised by Shire Leasing throughout their funding journey, from block discounting to the British Business Bank’s match funding and ENABLE funding facilities to medium-term notes.

Following on from the conference discussion, we asked AFC’s asset finance community leader Stephen Bassett to provide an analysis on the conference session, and his thoughts on the session along with the summary of proceedings in full can be found here.