Merchant

Elected officials are better off deciding who’s most deserving of federally backed coronavirus relief funds for small businesses.

Barclays has experienced an incremental £264 million (about $330 million) in contactless spend in the month since it raised its per-transaction limit in response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has created an aversion to cash and contact payments.

Paytronix, whose technology enables mobile payments and ordering at restaurants, has received $10 million in funding to help support increased demand for its services through the pandemic.

Fintechs in the payments industry saw problems coming when the CARES Act’s SBA Paycheck Protection Program opened the floodgates for millions of coronavirus-stricken small businesses to apply for loans.

Lawmakers should approve a program to distribute stimulus funds using a government-sanctioned coin, which would be speedier than the current system.

Portal crashes, technology glitches, last-minute changes in guidance, renewed suspicions about loan dispersal: Meet the new Paycheck Protection Program, same as the old Paycheck Protection Program.

Many businesses are turning to the popular videoconferencing platform to stay connected to employees, but institutions need to think about measures they can take to utilize it safely.

Community banks that have used the Paycheck Protection Program to help businesses ride out the coronavirus outbreak are looking to turn that goodwill into deeper loan and deposit relationships down the road.

Queued-up loans. Extra bankers. Government tweaks to promote fairness. None of these precautionary measures has been enough for the second round of the Paycheck Protection Program to avoid the pitfalls of the first.

As banks accept new applications for the paycheck program, they are dogged by complaints that they prioritized wealthy borrowers. But lenders likely fast-tracked clients they knew best under difficult circumstances, observers say.