Japan's Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp (SMBC) will provide a loan of 10 billion yen (57.59 million pounds) to electronics maker Sharp Corp, sources with direct knowledge of the matter said on Thursday.

SMBC, the core banking unit of Japan's No. 3 lender Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc (SMFG) , joins two bigger rivals as a creditor of Sharp, in a sign of banks' growing confidence over the company's turnaround, said one of the sources, who were not authorised to discuss the matter publicly.

The other two top lenders, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc and Mizuho Financial Group Inc, have traditionally been the main creditors of the Osaka-based company, with outstanding loans of roughly 400 billion yen each. But SMFG has almost no loans to it.

Officials of SMBC and Sharp were not immediately available for comment.

Sharp, which once enjoyed stellar status as a maker of flat panel televisions and television screens, was hurt by competition from Asian rivals and racked up combined losses of more than $9 billion (5.63 billion pounds) over two years, before climbing back into the black for the year that ended in March.