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LONDON, March 16 (Reuters) - Lloyds Bank said itwill grow its lending to small-and-medium enterprises (SMEs) bya further 1 billion pounds this year, seeing stronger growthprospects for smaller businesses as Britain's economic recoverytakes hold.
Lloyds's pledge comes after British politicians launched aninquiry last month into the lending practices of banks to smallbusinesses last month. Britain's competition watchdog is alsoconsidering a small business banking probe.
Banks such as Royal Bank of Scotland have beenaccused of sucking cash out of viable small businesses whileother major banks have been criticised for not offering enoughcredit to SMEs.
Lloyds said the move would help underpin its track record inSME lending, which has increased against a decline across thewider banking industry.
"We are now seeing the recovery gathering pace and there aremore reasons for small and medium-sized enterprises to beoptimistic and to start investing for growth," Lloyds's managingdirector of SME and mid markets banking, Tim Hinton, said in astatement.
Apart from the growth in lending, it plans to double theamount of money local bank managers are able to lend withoutcentral approval to 1 million pounds, a policy aimed at ensuringlending decisions are made more quickly.
Lloyds also intends to increase lending through tradefinance for overseas businesses by 25 percent during 2014.
