WASHINGTON — Sixty-one small banks will receive a total of $608 million in the latest round of funding from the Small Business Lending Fund, the Treasury Department said Wednesday.
Treasury has now awarded more than $2.4 billion to 191 community banks from the $30 billion fund, which was created as part of the Small Business Jobs Act last year.
The top recipients included First Bancorp in Troy, N.C., which received $63.5 million; CoBoz Financial Inc. in Denver, which received $57.4 million; Nicolet Bankshares Inc. in Green Bay, Wisc., which received $24.4 million; and Two Rivers Financial Group Inc. in Burlington, Iowa, which received $23.2 million.
Treasury is expected to distribute another $1.9 billion before the program’s Sept. 27 expiration date.
The fund was established to encourage banks with less than $10 billion in assets to increase their lending to small businesses. Under the program, participants can reduce the size of the dividend they pay the government as they increase their small-business lending.
