Arbuthnot Banking Group delivers strong profitable growth for 2023

Arbuthnot Banking Group, the holding company for Arbuthnot Latham & Co., Limited, delivered strong and profitable growth for the year ended 31st December 2023, reporting a profit before tax of £47.1m.

This represents a continued trend of improved financial performance compared to the prior years and an increase of 135% over 2022 which was £20.0m.

Commenting on the results, Sir Henry Angest (pictured), Chairman and Chief Executive of Arbuthnot, said: “Arbuthnot delivered an exceptional performance in 2023, enabled by the continued delivery of the Group’s “Future State 2” strategic plan, focused on diversification, first-rate client service and helped by rising interest rates.

“We are confident that the continued delivery of our strategic plan will enable Arbuthnot to prosper through the softening monetary environment we anticipate in the year ahead.”

With the Group, asset finance business, Renaissance Asset Finance (RAF), reported a profit before tax of £1.6m (2022: £0.2m) with a loan book of £198.8m equating to an increase of 49% compared to the prior year end balance of £133.8m. Both of its business sectors, “flow” and “block discounting”, saw good levels of new loan originations in 2023.

RAF has also added wholesale financing to its product set, and this will come online in 2024.

Vehicle leasing business, Asset Alliance Group (AAG), also delivered outstanding growth with its assets available for lease growing to £327m from £189m in the prior year, an increase of 73%.

This growth was enabled not only by the improvements in the supply chain for new trucks, but also the fact that it now has access to the Group’s funding resources. This allowed it to complete the purchase of a £50m portfolio of buses used in the Transport for London network. Asset Alliance now has an 8% market share of buses used in London.

AAG generated a loss before tax of £3.2m (2022: loss of £2.1m for the period).