Lack of friends forces lender to close

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Amigo is to shut itself down and financially wipe out its shareholders after the troubled sub-prime lender failed to drum up investor support for a last-ditch £45 million fundraising.

The demise of the company that was once Britain's biggest guarantor lender comes less than five years after it listed on the London stock market at a £1.3 billion valuation.

Since then, however, it has been crippled by hundreds of thousands of complaints from borrowers who claimed they were mis-sold high-interest loans and demanded compensation.

Its bosses had tried to save the business through a High Court-approved restructuring that would have refocused the company on to a new suite of loan products under a brand called RewardRate. This revamp, however, was contingent on Amigo successfully raising