British Business Bank agrees ENABLE Guarantee transaction of up to £500m with agricultural specialist lender, Oxbury Bank
Press release
The British Business Bank has agreed a new ENABLE Guarantee transaction of up to £500m with Oxbury Bank. Oxbury is a specialist agricultural bank that offers a range of lending and asset finance solutions tailored to the specific needs of farm businesses, supporting food production and the rural economy.
The new transaction will further support agricultural term lending to small-and-medium-sized farming businesses to invest in their operations, improve productivity and support long-term growth across the rural economy.
It will also continue to include a pricing discount to Oxbury for lending that meets certain sustainability metrics, for example, reducing carbon emissions or utilising renewable energy.
This is the second ENABLE Guarantee bank transaction to include a junior investor within the structure. This demonstrates the effectiveness of this approach in giving specialist banks access to this investor base.
Under the transaction structure the British Business Bank will guarantee the senior position, whilst global investment firm Davidson Kempner Capital Management will provide the junior investment. Oxbury will retain a portion of the credit risk across each underlying agreement.
The transaction reflects the British Business Bank’s greater risk appetite in supporting small and medium-sized farming businesses, with its structure and scale resulting in the Bank’s largest single-facility exposure to date.
This transaction follows on from a previous £100m ENABLE Guarantee transaction with Oxbury, originally announced in November 2023, with subsequent increases announced in July 2024 and again in February 2025 to £300m. This transaction has facilitated over £425m of finance to over 400 small and medium-sized farming businesses in that time..
Since 2022 the British Business Bank has also invested £35m in Oxbury via Tier 2 capital facilities. This is in line with our approach to partner with the private sector to increase the supply and variety of debt finance available to smaller businesses across the UK.
Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said:
Too many good businesses are held back because they can't get access to the finance they need to invest and grow.
Whether it's buying new machinery, expanding the business or making plans for the years ahead, farmers need the confidence that finance will be there when they need it. This £500m ENABLE Guarantee will help make that happen.
Michael Strevens, Managing Director, Structured Financial Institution Solutions, British Business Bank, said:
This £500m ENABLE Guarantee with Oxbury Bank represents another significant step forward in our support for the farming sector and partnership with Oxbury.
Bringing another investor into the specialist finance market further demonstrates how using our guarantees can leverage in institutional capital previously unable to access smaller business lending, helping to generate long term growth for the UK economy.
We are delighted to build on our partnership with Oxbury and the £425m of lending we have supported them with recently and look forward to seeing it further grow its support to farming and rural businesses across England, Scotland and Wales.
James Farrar, Co-Founder and CEO of Oxbury Bank, said:
This transaction marks another important milestone in Oxbury's growth and our mission to support farmers, food producers and the wider rural economy. Since 2022, the British Business Bank has been a strong and valued partner, recognising early on the importance of ensuring that agriculture has access to specialist, long-term finance.
The sector is facing both opportunities and challenges as businesses look to invest in productivity and the transition towards more sustainable farming systems. These investments often require significant capital today, with the benefits realised over many years through stronger yields, supply chains and improved business resilience.
The British Business Bank has consistently demonstrated an understanding of the vital role agriculture plays in the UK economy, both now and for future generations. Their continued support enables Oxbury to expand our successful specialist lending model, helping more farmers access the competitive finance they need to invest with confidence and build a stronger future for British agriculture.
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Notes to editors
About the British Business Bank
The British Business Bank is the UK government’s economic development bank. Established in November 2014, its mission is to drive economic growth by helping smaller businesses get the finance they need to start, scale and stay in the UK. Its remit is to design, deliver and efficiently manage UK-wide smaller business access to finance programmes for the UK government.
In 2025/261, the Bank supported UK smaller businesses to access £9.4bn of finance, made up of £1.3bn of public funding, £4.3bn of private capital crowded in by the Bank and £3.7bn of lending the Bank guaranteed. The funding benefited 38,000 UK businesses, including around 30,000 businesses the Bank had not previously helped to fund.
British Business Bank plc is a public limited company registered in England and Wales, registration number 08616013, registered office at Steel City House, West Street, Sheffield, S1 2GQ. It is a development bank wholly owned by HM Government. British Business Bank plc and its subsidiaries are not banking institutions and do not operate as such.
With the exception of BBB Investment Services Limited they are not authorised or regulated by the Prudential Regulation Authority or the Financial Conduct Authority. BBB Investment Services Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. A complete legal structure chart for the group can be found at british-business-bank.co.uk.
The transaction described above does not constitute or imply any endorsement, warranty or recommendation by the UK government, the British Business Bank plc, its subsidiaries or any other party of Oxbury Bank, Davidson Kempner Capital Management or their products or services.
The ENABLE Guarantees programme is managed by British Business Financial Services Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of British Business Bank plc, on behalf of, and with the financial backing of, the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade.
About Oxbury Bank
Oxbury was established by bankers, farmers, agricultural businesses, and technologists, combining the worlds of farming, financial services, and technology to create the UK's first and only fintech with a full banking license, focusing solely on serving customers in the agricultural sector.
Our mission is to transform the agriculture finance market and enable the sector’s drive towards a more productive and sustainable farming and food supply chain.
Oxbury provides lending, savings and technology solutions designed specifically for British agriculture. Through our savings products, we enable customers to support UK farming while earning competitive returns, with customer deposits helping to fund lending that supports the growth and resilience of farm businesses across the country.
British farming and food production is undergoing an evolutionary transition, and farm businesses need more customised finance and data driven solutions to help facilitate the generational shifts necessary to enhance sustainability, provenance, and production standards across the farming and food supply chain.
Our tech team makes up one-third of our total headcount, reflecting our deep strengths in technology and digital banking. Oxbury Earth is our own purpose-built, cloud-native tech platform, delivering industry-leading digital banking, and payments solutions.
The Oxbury Earth platform also elevates data analysis for farmers by blending agronomic, financial, and environmental performance data and enables us to collaborate across the entire agrifood supply chain to enhance traceability and resilience.
Oxbury's co-founders are food and farming focussed. James Farrar (CEO) was the founding CEO of ClearBank, the UK’s first new, full-service clearing bank for over 250 years and former senior business banking executive at major UK banks. Nick Evans (MD) founded, ran, and successfully exited F4F (part of Adaptris), a software business with 2,500 customers in the global agricultural and animal health sectors. Both previously held senior roles in the UK banking industry.
The extended leadership team has many years of experience running some of the largest farm-supporting organisations and includes the former chairmen of NFU Mutual and AMC (Agriculture Mortgage Corporation).
Oxbury is a brand name of Oxbury Bank Plc which is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority (Financial Services Register number: 834822).
About Davidson Kempner Capital Management
Davidson Kempner Capital Management LP is a global investment management firm with over 40 years of experience and a focus on fundamental investing with a multi-strategy approach. Davidson Kempner has more than $40bn in assets under management and around 500 employees across eight offices: New York, Philadelphia, London, Dublin, Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Mumbai and Abu Dhabi. Additional information is available at: davidsonkempner.com.