NatWest Faces Scrutiny After £250 Million Funding of Failed Consumer Lender Revealed
Official filings have revealed that Britain’s NatWest provided financing facilities of up to £250 million to London-based consumer lender Amplifi Capital before the company entered insolvency, highlighting banks’ growing exposure to non-bank financial institutions (NBFIs) amid increasing regulatory scrutiny.
According to a Reuters review of corporate filings, NatWest financed Castor Financing between 2023 and 2025. The special purpose vehicle purchased loan portfolios from Amplifi Capital and securitized them, providing the primary source of funding for the lender’s expansion in the unsecured consumer credit market.
Amplifi Capital, which reported £119 million in total assets in its latest financial statements for the year ended March 2024, entered insolvency proceedings in June after struggling to comply with new UK consumer credit regulations.
The filings show that Amplifi secured a £100 million securitisation warehouse facility from NatWest in September 2023 to support its lending growth. The facility was subsequently increased to £250 million in March 2025, according to Vienna Stock Exchange records relating to the securitised notes.
The documents also reveal that UK asset manager M&G participated in the financing by holding up to £56 million of Castor’s Class B notes. M&G said it continued to support Amplifi during its financial difficulties, including deferring interest payments in an effort to help the business remain operational.
NatWest and Interpath, the administrator overseeing Amplifi’s insolvency, declined to comment. Amplifi’s former chief executive and chairman did not respond to requests for comment, while both the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) declined to comment, citing their policy of not discussing individual firms.
Founded in 2013 as a lender serving credit unions, Amplifi expanded into unsecured consumer lending in 2022 through its Reevo brand, offering personal loans with interest rates ranging from 23% to 50%.
To finance its expansion, Amplifi sold portions of its loan portfolio to Castor Financing, which securitized the assets and issued notes to investors, including NatWest, giving the bank indirect exposure to higher-risk consumer lending.
The case comes as global regulators, led by the Bank of England, continue to assess the potential systemic risks posed by non-bank financial institutions following a series of high-profile failures, including the collapse of UK mortgage lender Market Financial Solutions, which owed approximately £1.8 billion.
According to the European Central Bank, European banks’ exposure to non-bank financial institutions increased to 11% of total assets by the end of 2025, up from around 6% a decade earlier, reflecting the sector’s growing importance within the financial system.
Amplifi’s latest financial statements also showed the company swung to a £100,000 loss in the year ended March 2024, compared with a £5.5 million profit the previous year, as new regulatory requirements and weakening business performance ultimately contributed to its collapse.
