The announcement arrives as the bank altered its strategy after releasing its full-year results and scaled-back its plans for branch expansion over the next few years.

Metro Bank’ s results showed an underlying loss before tax of £11.7m and statutory loss before tax of £130.8m. The bank also saw a £68m write-down relating to its discontinuation of work-in-progress on IT projects that no longer feature in the lender’s altered strategy.

As part of its new strategy, Metro Bank has back-peddled on plans to open 15 new branches in the North of England, compared to the 30 stores promised to the BRC Capability and Innovation Fund, which has been issuing cash to challenger brands prepared to promote and increase competition in the market for banking services to SMEs.

Metro, Starling and ClearBank were granted a combined £280m from the RBS bailout fund in February 2019, successfully staving off competition from larger banks such as TSB, Co-operative Bank and CYBG, Finextra reports.

Metro Bank was allocated the largest amount of funding, securing £120m.

The repayment of the funding has been matched by a decision within the bank to move away from niche SME propositions that benefit a smaller group of firms, including secured lending transformation, virtual accounts and pooling.

The bank has said it will ‘streamline its back-office operations’ by moving to cost-efficient locations, modernising contact-centre technology, digitisation/automation of services and the reduce organisational layers across the bank.

Dan Frumkin, chief executive officer at Metro Bank, said: “Our financial performance reflects a very challenging year for Metro Bank. External headwinds, internal challenges and actions we took to put the business on a more positive trajectory are reflected in the results.

“Despite this, Metro Bank’s market-leading service proposition continued to deliver growth in customer accounts, and our balance sheet ended the year in a materially stronger position. We’ve fully evaluated our strategy, and have a clear plan which will return the bank to sustainable growth built around a community banking model.

“An enhanced focus on costs, improved productivity, and investment in our infrastructure will enable our deposit-led franchise to deliver profitable growth over the medium term.”