UK Export Finance has fired the largest single shot in its century-long history, setting aside a fresh £50 billion to bankroll British defence exports at a moment when the world is rearming faster than at any time since the Cold War.
The new Defence Export Fund takes the government’s export credit agency from an £80 billion ceiling to a total capacity of £130 billion, with the additional £50 billion ring-fenced to support large-scale defence sales and shore up Britain’s competitiveness in a market that is expanding at remarkable speed. For an agency that has spent 100 years quietly underwriting the deals that keep British goods moving across borders, it is a statement of intent.
The timing is no accident. Global military expenditure climbed to a record $2.7 trillion in 2024, a 9.4 per cent year-on-year jump that, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, was the steepest rise since at least the end of the Cold War. Spending rose across all five of the world’s regions, driven by the war in Ukraine, conflict in the Middle East and a broad reappraisal of national security among Western governments. Allies are not only spending more, they are actively shopping for the kind of advanced capability that British industry is well placed to supply.
The mechanics are straightforward enough. UKEF will guarantee the bank loans taken out by British defence exporters as they fulfil contracts, and it will provide or back the financing extended to other countries buying British defence products. In practice that means a UK manufacturer can compete for a major overseas order knowing the financing is underwritten by the government, while the purchasing nation gets access to a competitive, state-backed payment package alongside the kit itself.
That combination, world-leading hardware paired with government-backed finance, is what ministers hope will tip large contracts in Britain’s favour. The fund is open to defence businesses of every size, from established prime contractors to the smaller firms looking to break into international markets for the first time, a constituency that has historically found export finance hard to navigate.
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