Through ClearBank’s cutting-edge cloud-based banking platform, Oxbury will gain full access to the UK payment schemes.

Oxbury gained its full UK bank licence in early 2020 and is in its final mobilisation stages with invitation-only customers before launching fully to the wider market this autumn. The bank is targeting a 5% lending market share within five years of launch in a market where 70% of lending is still controlled by the big four banks.

The Agricultural supply chain requires a funding revolution. Farms and food producers face an unprecedented period of change during the post-Covid recovery. Brexit-driven farm payments reform and the wider challenges of a new global trading regime and environmental requirements require a dedicated and specialist financial partner to support this transition.

With a dedicated focus on farming, food and the rural economy, Oxbury will combine its agriculture and fintech expertise to provide farm business with purpose-built lending and savings products, delivered through its proprietary Oxbury Bank Platform “OxP”. The bank aims to secure at least 5% market share in the farm lending market by 2025.

The bank’s exclusive flagship product - Oxbury Farm Credit - will offer a competitive alternative to traditional banks’ overdrafts or trade finance. It solves the problem of farm businesses having to fund their inputs many months or years before receiving income from the sale of the produced goods, tying up valuable cash in the production cycle and holding back the growth of food production.

Oxbury Farm Credit’s financial dashboard and payments platform will provide farm businesses with a revolving credit account, enabling them to manage and spread the cost of all their inputs to suit their cashflow. This is an entirely new way for farm businesses to manage their day to day finances and associated administration and is unmatched in the banking industry.

As a modern digital Bank, Oxbury’s brand-new OxP Platform architecture comprises native microservices running as docker containers in AWS, next generation API standards used to power web, mobile and integrated UIs in multi-availability zone deployments to ensure a resilient and secure service supported with passwordless multi-factor authentication. The OxP links seamlessly to other state-of-the-art infrastructure providers including ClearBank.

ClearBank’s API and technology platform are designed to offer real-time access to a full range of Banking-as-a-Service solutions. ClearBank is the only UK clearing bank not to provide products to end-customers, ensuring there are never competitive tensions with client business models. Not least because all client funds are held at The Bank of England and not used for investment purposes. ClearBank will facilitate the real-time payments for Oxbury and the partnership will help to deliver a seamless customer experience.

Charles McManus, CEO of ClearBank said:
“As the only specialist agricultural bank in the UK, Oxbury is fulfilling a vital need, providing the agricultural community with a focussed and trusted banking provider. We’re really pleased to have been selected by Oxbury and look forward to a long-term relationship, helping to support the needs of British farmers and the rural economy.”

James Farrar, CEO of Oxbury said:
“Today’s news marks another step towards the launch of Oxbury to the wider market. Through ClearBank’s next generation banking solutions we can now access the UK payment schemes which is another step in us realising our goal of becoming the go-to bank for farmers, food producers and the rural economy.”