The report indicates that NACFB members account for nearly two-thirds of broker-facilitated SME lending in the UK, placing the total broker-led market at approximately £50bn annually.

The data shows that, during 2025, the NACFB’s broker members arranged 180,000 loans for UK businesses, generating an estimated £12bn in direct gross value added (GVA).

When wider economic effects are included, the total impact rises to £19.2bn, with lending activity supporting an estimated 185,000 additional jobs.

Further, 62% of broker-facilitated lending was delivered outside London and the South East, highlighting the intermediary market’s “significant role” in driving regional economic growth, according to the report.

The analysis drew on lender and broker survey data to explore transaction volumes, market dynamics, emerging friction points, regulatory considerations and expectations for the year ahead, along with independent third-party insight to provide a “holistic, evidence-led view of the sector.”

For the first time, the association said, it has combined internal CRM data, broker survey responses and lender insight to build a detailed demographic and economic profile of its membership base, which now stands at 1,400 broker firms and more than 3,000 individual brokers — the largest in its history.

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Jim Higginbotham, CEO at the NACFB (pictured above), commented: “For most within our industry, the central role of brokers in SME finance has long been understood through experience.

“What this report does is provide external, data-backed evidence of that reality. The scale is unmistakable.

“This is no longer a peripheral channel within SME finance. Intermediaries are a structural component of how funding flows to small businesses.

“The evidence shows a mature, resilient and increasingly influential intermediary market — one that policymakers, lenders and stakeholders cannot afford to overlook.”

Kieran Jones, head of communications and advocacy at the NACFB, added: “The £33bn headline understandably draws attention, but the real substance of this report sits beneath that number.

“When you look closely at the data, you see brokers considering an average of six lenders per deal, a quarter of clients having been declined elsewhere before being successfully funded, and nearly two-thirds of lending delivered outside London and the South East.

“Those details reveal how this market actually operates — through careful structuring, regional reach and problem-solving capability.

“We also see a shift in behaviour. Relationships are increasingly ongoing rather than transactional, core lender panels are deepening, and a growing proportion of lender portfolios are now broker-originated. That speaks to maturity and consolidation, not fragmentation.”

The full Intermediary Market Outlook 2025/26 is available to read here.