The refinancing wall in Derby
174 companies in the DE postcode area sit inside an estimated 2026 to 2028 refinancing window, counted from the Companies House register of charges as at 2026-07-07. A further 54 have a window that has not yet opened, and 81 are already past their estimated window end.
174 companies in DE postcodes are inside a refinancing window now.
Of 309 companies in the area carrying a dated facility signal on the charge register, 174 were inside their estimated refinancing window at 2026-07-07. The register records when a charge was created but never when the facility matures, so the window is an estimate built from the creation date and a customary tenor for that charge type and holder. The register does not record maturities, so these are windows rather than dates.
174
Companies in the DE postcode area inside an estimated 2026-2028 refinancing window, as at 2026-07-07.
Source · Companies House register of charges, 2026-07-07 (RUN-REPORT.md); CH bulk snapshot 2026-07-01. Solon Corporate Finance.
Derby’s wall peaks in Q4 2026, with 203 windows open.
| Quarter | Windows open |
|---|---|
| Q1 2026 | 189 |
| Q2 2026 | 192 |
| Q3 2026 | 190 |
| Q4 2026 | 203 |
| Q1 2027 | 197 |
| Q2 2027 | 193 |
| Q3 2027 | 178 |
| Q4 2027 | 166 |
| Q1 2028 | 146 |
| Q2 2028 | 136 |
| Q3 2028 | 118 |
| Q4 2028 | 99 |
Derby’s peak quarter
Estimated windows open in each quarter, counted where a window overlaps the quarter. Windows are derived from charge creation dates and customary tenors, never from reported maturities, so every column is an estimate and is drawn hatched.
Source · Companies House register of charges. Solon Corporate Finance, as at 2026-07-07.
Counts are FLOORS from a prioritised sample (83,957 scored companies drawn from a ~1.8m-company ICP universe; hydration was rate-limited and prioritised), one primary facility window per company, three ICP sector groups only. Sector/region SHARES reflect pipeline composition, not the UK market distribution.
Derby peaks in Q4 2026, two quarters early, and is the only area where NatWest holds more paper than HSBC.
Derby reaches its peak in Q4 2026, two full quarters before the national wall, with 203 windows open. It is also the area with the highest proportion of companies already past their estimated window end: 81 against 174 still inside one. Both numbers say the same thing. The refinancing pressure in Derby is not a 2027 problem, it is a now problem, and a borrower here reading this in the second half of 2026 is already inside the twelve-month runway that makes a full process possible.
Derby is one of only two areas where NatWest Group holds more in-window paper than HSBC, and clearing banks hold 60.3% against 54.9% nationally. Challenger and specialist lenders hold just 7.5% against a national 10.7%. That is a narrow incumbent base by any reading, and a narrow base is precisely the condition under which running a competitive process is worth the most, because the alternatives a borrower has never met are the ones that price the incumbent honestly.
Who holds Derby’s in-window facilities, against the national mix.
The incumbent on an in-window facility is the lender a borrower will refinance with or away from, so the mix says who the area is currently banked by, and how much of the market it has not met. In Derby, clearing banks hold 60.3% of in-window facilities against 54.9% nationally, and challenger and specialist banks 7.5% against 10.7%.
Clearing banks hold 60.3% of Derby’s in-window facilities, against 54.9% nationally.
Derby (DE)All areas, nationally
| Lender category | Derby | National |
|---|---|---|
| Clearing banks | 60.3% | 54.9% |
| Unclassified holders | 24.1% | 27.7% |
| Challenger & specialist banks | 7.5% | 10.7% |
| Trustee-held (lender not named) | 8% | 6.3% |
| Debt funds | 0% | 0.4% |
Share of the area's in-window facilities by the category of the charge holder, against the same split nationally. Where a charge is registered to a security trustee or agent vehicle the lender is not named on the register at all, so named-lender categories are floors.
Source · Companies House register of charges. Solon Corporate Finance, as at 2026-07-07.
- NatWest Group30
- HSBC Group29
- Lloyds Banking Group22
- Barclays18
- the co operative3
Named holders are floors. Where a charge is registered to a security trustee, nominee or agent vehicle, the lender is not named on the register at all, so those facilities are counted in the total but appear against no institution. In Derby that applies to 8% of in-window facilities.
Manufacturing accounts for 36.2% of Derby’s in-window companies, against 26.1% nationally.
Sector decides what a facility can be secured on. A manufacturer with plant, stock and a debtor book has asset-based options that a services business does not, and a services business is judged almost entirely on how durable its earnings look through a cycle. The in-window companies in DE postcodes break down as follows.
- Business services81
- Manufacturing63
- Wholesale and distribution30
The sample covers three business-to-business sector groups, so these are shares within that scope rather than the sector composition of the area’s economy.
The 174 companies already inside a window in Derby have the least room to negotiate.
A full refinancing taken properly to market runs about three to four months from first lender conversation to completion, and the preparation before it takes longer than most boards expect. Twelve months of runway buys a competitive process. Six months buys a negotiation with the incumbent. Three months buys whatever the incumbent offers. That is the whole reason the timing of this count matters rather than its size.
On that measure Derby splits three ways. The 174 companies inside a window now are the ones with the least room, because a lender reading a facility as near-term prices it accordingly. The 81 already past their estimated window end have usually extended or rolled with the incumbent, which is a decision rather than a failure, but it is rarely a priced one. The 54 whose window has not opened yet are the ones with real choice, and they are the ones for whom starting early is worth the most. The area peaks in Q4 2026, ahead of the national Q2 2027, so a borrower here reaches credit committees while capacity for the year is still uncommitted.
Three things are worth doing before approaching anyone. Pull your own charge register at Companies House and check what is recorded against the company, including charges you repaid years ago that were never satisfied, because a lender will look before you do and an unexpected entry changes the read. Establish the EBITDA that survives diligence rather than the one you report, since that is the number a multiple gets applied to. And decide what you are optimising for, because the cheapest facility, the most flexible one and the one with the most covenant headroom are rarely the same offer.
- What proximity to maturity costs · the week-by-week shape of a refinancing, and what each month of lost runway is worth.
- Reading your own charge register · what the entries on your Companies House file say, and why repaid charges linger on it.
- What lenders look for in your accounts · how the EBITDA scrub works and what it does to the facility you can raise.
- The lender map · who is lending at £3m to £15m, by type, beyond the clearers holding 60.3% of the paper here.
How the Derby figure is counted, and what it cannot support.
Every company on the register that grants security files a charge, and that filing carries a creation date but no maturity and no amount. The estimated window is the creation date plus a customary tenor for the charge type and holder, with a half-width of one to one and a half years, and one primary window per company. The national method, the tenor priors and the full tables sit on the UK refinancing wall reference page, and the dated reading of what the count means is in the refi wall, counted.
Nationally, 83,957 companies were scored, 26,383 carry a dated facility signal, and 14,675 sit inside a window at 2026-07-07. The Derby figures are the DE postcode slice of that count on the same basis, so they are directly comparable with the national ones and with the other areas.
Journalists and analysts are welcome to use these figures with attribution. The press page carries the citation string, and the underlying tables are downloadable from example work.
The same count, elsewhere.
- Nottingham228 in window · peaks Q1 2027
- Birmingham529 in window · peaks Q2 2027
- Manchester380 in window · peaks Q2 2027
- Sheffield276 in window · peaks Q2 2027