This session will provide insight into the direction of sectors of U.S. small business market by examining borrowing activities and risk profiles by industries and geographic regions. The data presented will focus on businesses with C&I loan exposures less than $1 million to specifically profile the small business borrower category. It will also provide a forward-looking risk forecast, identifying confidence indicators that small businesses will need to meet with their loan obligations by industry and geographic region.

This session is designed to help bankers identify small business lending opportunities by examining the potential timing and strength of an economic recovery by sector, being mindful of the structural changes that were underway prior to the Great Recession. The objectives include: • Differentiate leading and viable industries from the laggards and losers as a more robust recovery kicks in; • Explain why some industries are procyclical, countercyclical, or neutral and; • Identify which industries are likely to remain moribund or fade away in the post-recession economy; • Factoring vintage performance into and out of strategies; • Focusing on industry credit needs and appropriate facility types. We’ll also consider the implications of regulatory scrutiny given the possibility that the economy may fall prey to stagflation or a double-dip. This top-down, industry-by-industry approach offers attendees a pragmatic, actionable balance of prudent market strategies and efficient risk mitigation.

Lending more and writing off less is the dilemma for every credit officer and portfolio manager. Current tools won't get us there. Credit bureau scores and traditional ratio models aren't getting the approvals or avoiding the losses we need them to. But every bank has the data that can enable behavioral risk scoring models proven more predictive in risk scoring, and support daily issuance of loss-reducing asset management workflows. Some have started using their constant inflow of SMB sales data and are generating more loans and building more small business relationships -- both in the U.S. and internationally. Attend this session to learn how they are doing it.

The key to helping our customers and at the same time keeping losses to a minimum is an effective early warning system combined with a well-define loss mitigating process. This session will address some of the leading efforts to assist both our customers and our institutions.