British banks lost the lending lead in 22 poorer countries

Claim types Fact

BIS consolidated banking statistics, foreign claims of domestic banks by nationality of the reporting bank, guarantor (ultimate risk) basis, end-quarter, US$ millions (BIS WS_CBS_PUB, Q4 2010 and Q4 2025; Q2 2026 checked), read from the BIS SDMX API via the progrss vault (loaded from stats.bis.org; vault rule GUIDELINES §4.11; source bis-stats passes value checks, 3 matches, 0 mismatches). Set: the 116 low- and middle-income countries in the World Bank International Debt Statistics with BIS claims data at both dates (Tajikistan's 2025 total is below zero; it changes no result). Lenders: the 20 banking systems that report ultimate-risk claims at both dates (Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, India, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Türkiye, the United Kingdom, the United States); Korea and Ireland, which joined later, are left out and change no result. Top foreign lender = the banking nationality with the largest claims on that country; progrss calculation. Then (33) vs now (16): British banks kept the lead in 11 (China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Kenya, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Mauritius, Botswana, Maldives, Malawi, The Gambia) and gained it in 5 small ones (Belarus, Bhutan, Eswatini, Guyana, Suriname). The 22 that left: United States 9 (South Africa, Nigeria, India, Zambia, Uganda, Honduras, Belize, Afghanistan, St Vincent and the Grenadines), France 7 (Ghana, Jordan, Tanzania, Georgia, Cambodia, Armenia, Zimbabwe), Japan 3 (Indonesia, Philippines, Viet Nam), Spain (Liberia), Türkiye (Iraq), Austria (Lesotho). In India US banks lead by 0.5% (US$96.3bn vs US$95.9bn); in Q2 2026 the count is still 16. British banks' claims on South Africa fell from US$95.2bn to US$9.5bn. Map colours: British banks' share of the 20 systems' foreign claims on each country at end-2025. Caveats: BIS rows that are 0 for non-reporting countries (China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Norway, offshore centres) are not zero lending; Chinese, Gulf and other non-reporting banks are not counted, so this is the lead among BIS-reporting banks only. Claims are measured in US dollars, so currency moves change the value of local-currency lending. Liberia's claims are mostly shipping. Claims are positions, not new lending. Source: BIS. Licence: plates only, never in a paid pack.