As well as this, its NIM has continued to increase, reaching 130bps in June 2021.
Losses continued to shrink for the full year to 31 March 2021, to an underlying operating loss of £36m (2020: £46m) and statutory loss before other charges of £49m (2020: £57m).
Since March 2020, Atom has diversified its savings range by introducing its Instant Access Saver, completing its largest mortgage securitisation transaction to date (£0.8bn), and placing a focus on business lending which saw balances grow from £240m to £662m.
Atom was also accredited as a Coronavirus Business Interruption Loans Scheme (CBILS) lender in 2020. The bank is on track to have provided £1bn in total lending to SMEs by September 2021.
Atom partnered with Thought Machine to deliver Vault, a cloud native and smart contract-based banking core, which was used to launch Atom’s Instant Access Saver, now with over £1bn of customer savings balances.
All savings accounts and balances were successfully migrated to the new platform, and Atom has made improvements to its banking apps.
Mark Mullen, chief executive at Atom, said: “Throughout 2020 we served our customers with simple, transparent and competitively priced products and a first class customer experience.
“We continue to believe that the established banking model is well past its sell-by date.
“Too often it frustrates customers, antagonises regulators, disappoints investors and disengages employees. Why accept adequate when excellence is available?
“Atom has momentum, in recent years we have invested significantly in the business and now we’re seeing the results.
“Our losses are shrinking and we achieved our first monthly operating profit in June of 202.
“We’re confident that we will deliver sustainable profitability in the weeks and months ahead as we continue our journey to IPO”.
