The refinancing wall in Stoke-on-Trent
164 companies in the ST 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 47 have a window that has not yet opened, and 68 are already past their estimated window end.
164 companies in ST postcodes are inside a refinancing window now.
Of 279 companies in the area carrying a dated facility signal on the charge register, 164 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.
164
Companies in the ST 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.
Stoke-on-Trent’s wall peaks in Q4 2026, with 185 windows open.
| Quarter | Windows open |
|---|---|
| Q1 2026 | 160 |
| Q2 2026 | 176 |
| Q3 2026 | 182 |
| Q4 2026 | 185 |
| Q1 2027 | 172 |
| Q2 2027 | 170 |
| Q3 2027 | 161 |
| Q4 2027 | 143 |
| Q1 2028 | 131 |
| Q2 2028 | 124 |
| Q3 2028 | 106 |
| Q4 2028 | 85 |
Stoke-on-Trent’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.
Stoke has the highest challenger and specialist bank share in the sample, and peaks two quarters early.
Challenger and specialist banks hold 15.2% of Stoke’s in-window facilities, the highest share of any area here and half again the national 10.7%. Trustee-held paper is almost absent at 2.4%. Stoke is a market of straightforward bilateral facilities where non-clearing lenders have already won meaningful ground, which is useful evidence for a local borrower: the specialist banks are not theoretical here, they are already lending to companies down the road.
Stoke peaks in Q4 2026 alongside Derby and Bradford, two quarters ahead of the national wall. The combination is unusually favourable. An area reaching its own peak early, with a lender base that already extends past the clearers, is one where a well-run process has genuine alternatives to work with and the time to use them.
Who holds Stoke-on-Trent’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 Stoke-on-Trent, clearing banks hold 54.3% of in-window facilities against 54.9% nationally, and challenger and specialist banks 15.2% against 10.7%.
Challenger and specialist banks hold 15.2% of Stoke-on-Trent’s in-window facilities, against 10.7% nationally.
Stoke-on-Trent (ST)All areas, nationally
| Lender category | Stoke-on-Trent | National |
|---|---|---|
| Clearing banks | 54.3% | 54.9% |
| Unclassified holders | 28% | 27.7% |
| Challenger & specialist banks | 15.2% | 10.7% |
| Trustee-held (lender not named) | 2.4% | 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.
- HSBC Group36
- NatWest Group23
- Barclays11
- Lloyds Banking Group11
- Close Brothers6
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 Stoke-on-Trent that applies to 2.4% of in-window facilities.
Manufacturing accounts for 29.9% of Stoke-on-Trent’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 ST postcodes break down as follows.
- Business services87
- Manufacturing49
- Wholesale and distribution28
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 164 companies already inside a window in Stoke-on-Trent 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 Stoke-on-Trent splits three ways. The 164 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 68 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 47 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 54.3% of the paper here.
How the Stoke-on-Trent 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 Stoke-on-Trent figures are the ST 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.
- Birmingham529 in window · peaks Q2 2027
- Shrewsbury109 in window · peaks Q2 2027
- Manchester380 in window · peaks Q2 2027
- Sheffield276 in window · peaks Q2 2027