Unlocking productivity with agentic lending

Here’s a sobering statistic: if UK productivity had maintained pre-2008 growth rates, today’s economy would be £300 billion larger. Across the Atlantic, the US faces similar productivity stagnation.

 

Small businesses, which account for around half of turnover in the UK private sector and around 44% of US GDP, are feeling the squeeze most acutely.

 

In the UK, the October 2024 Budget placed significant strain on SMBs, with National Insurance rising to 15% and the National Living Wage climbing 6.7% to £12.21 per hour. Now, with the Autumn Budget landing on the 26th November, small businesses are bracing for what comes next. Business rates relief has already been slashed from 75% to 40%, and there’s talk of changes to the VAT threshold that could force more businesses into compliance costs they can barely afford.

 

US small businesses are wrestling with their own pressures. According to the NFIB, in September 2025, 64% of small business owners reported that supply chain disruptions were affecting their business to some degree, up 10 points from August. Elevated Labour costs were also reported as the single most important problem for US small business owners.

 

But here’s what’s remarkable: despite everything, small businesses remain resilient. In the UK, 44% of struggling businesses are willing to pivot their strategy, while nearly nine out of ten SMBs stay confident about their prospects. US small businesses show the same grit.

 

The appetite is there. SMBs are ready to invest, hire and grow economies. The problem? Traditional lending models are actively working against this optimism.

 

So the question becomes: how do we give SMBs the financing tools and technology they actually need?

 

 

The financing bottleneck

The UK faces a £22 billion small business lending gap as traditional banks pull back, leaving businesses scrambling for options. The US has developed a more mature alternative finance ecosystem with diverse funding sources including robust SBA programmes and specialist lenders, but traditional banking constraints still hold many back.

 

Applying for bank loans is stressful, time-consuming and often ends in rejection. A restaurant navigating seasonal fluctuations or an e-commerce seller dealing with supply chain shifts can’t afford to wait weeks for approvals based on backward-looking credit scores that poorly predict future performance. Many don’t even bother applying as they’re too worried about rejection and don’t trust the existing processes.

 

While the US is ahead on alternative financing options, its regulatory environment creates its own headaches. US financial services must navigate a maze of federal and state-level requirements, creating significant barriers to innovation. Meanwhile, the UK’s centralised approach is supporting more innovative models.

 

The upcoming Data (Use and Access) Bill in the UK promises to be a game-changer, promoting smart data sharing across organisations and industries. The UK’s advanced fintech ecosystem and regulatory sophistication is creating space for agentic-enabled lending while establishing necessary guardrails.

 

Both regions show clear market appetite for financing that traditional banks simply won’t provide, and the technology to deliver it already exists.

 

 

Agentic lending as a growth lever

Agentic, non-traditional lending represents a fundamental shift in how capital reaches small businesses. Rather than forcing businesses through rigid application processes, these models embed financing decisions directly into platforms where businesses already operate. They process real-time transaction data, inventory flows and revenue patterns to deliver instant funding decisions.

 

The technology exists right now to analyse bank statements in seconds and extract insights that paint a comprehensive picture of business health, so why not utilise it? This approach looks at data points traditional lending completely ignores, focusing on operational metrics that genuinely predict repayment capacity.

 

Generative AI accelerates this dramatically. What once required manual underwriting now happens invisibly, integrated into checkout processes or dashboards. Businesses receive funding options almost instantly – sometimes before they even realise they need it.

 

Here’s a concrete example: imagine a Manchester restaurant owner preparing for the Christmas rush. With agentic lending, they could receive £50,000 within hours based on their transaction patterns and seasonal trends, rather than waiting six weeks for a bank to review last year’s accounts and probably say no. That’s the difference between capturing the opportunity and watching it slip away.

 

In the near future, AI agents won’t just analyse data, they’ll help small business owners actively run their operations. Picture logging into a POS system and seeing more than sales figures: personalised funding options, dynamic cash flow forecasts, and inventory prompts based on seasonal trends. This is the vision of a true financial co-pilot, an intelligent system that anticipates challenges, guides decisions, and eventually takes action to keep businesses thriving. 

 

 

What both markets can learn

The US demonstrates how diverse funding sources can create resilient capital markets despite regulatory complexity. Meanwhile, the UK shows how sophisticated regulation can balance innovation with consumer protection.

 

Both point to the same truth: speed, convenience and reliability are what small businesses need to thrive.

 

When the UK government introduces permanently lower business rates for retail, hospitality and leisure properties from April 2026, it’ll provide much-needed stability. But that’s still months away, and businesses need support now. Not just cost relief, but access to capital when opportunities arise.

 

Relieving the small business financing bottleneck will help address the productivity gap that’s held our economies back for years. When businesses access capital at the moment they need it, they can more readily invest, hire and scale.

 

The technology exists. The regulatory frameworks are emerging. Now we need to recognise that traditional lending models won’t close a gap they themselves helped to create. 

 

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Nima Montazeri is Chief Product Officer at Liberis

 

Main image courtesy of iStockPhoto.com and Natallia Saksonova