Secured lending has enjoyed another month of strong activity in December 2014, according to the latest Secured Loan Index of Loan Warehouse.
The expected slowdown around the festive period at the end of last year never happened. Instead there secured lending reached record highs in both December and the fourth quarter as a whole.
December lending reached £51.067 million, the best figure on record for this month since 2007. The increase compared to November was 25 per cent, bringing the total number of months with consecutive growth to 37.
The strong December helped raise the overall performance in the fourth quarter, making it the best period for secured lending since the first three months of 2009.
Lending for the whole 2014 broke through the £600 million threshold and was by 28.5 per cent higher than in 2013.
“At the start of the year, it was predicted that the industry would grow but a final lending figure for 2014 of more than £635,000,000 was above most people’s expectations. Let’s not forget this is an industry operating under a new regulator,” Matt Tristram, co-Founder and director of Loans Warehouse, commented.