Paycheck Protection Program

Members of the Small Business Committee signaled backing for broadening Paycheck Protection Program access for the smallest companies, encouraging participation by nonbank lenders and other improvements.

After initially processing the loans manually, the Minnesota bank turned to "low code" software to build the electronic forms and workflows needed to approve loan applications. The result: a more than fivefold increase in the number of loans it could process in a day.

Accountants, as well as lawyers and consultants, who helped small businesses apply for emergency relief funds through the Paycheck Protection Program want to be compensated. Are they entitled to be?

Small businesses that took out the loans will soon be applying for forgiveness; U.S. Secretary of State Pompeo and one of HSBC's large investors criticized the bank for buckling to Chinese pressure.

Activity in the Paycheck Protection Program has slowed in recent weeks, but Customers Bancorp and Fountainhead Capital continue to pursue loans aggressively in hopes of developing long-term borrower relationships.

Banks are looking to reduce their consumer credit risk exposure in the face of high unemployment; the drop in branch transactions is causing banks to rethink how many they need.

Lenders have a role to play in the national reconciliation that must follow the recent racial unrest — providing greater access to capital for African Americans and other underserved groups so they can build wealth, activists said at a panel discussion hosted by Berkshire Bank in Boston.

Big banks call for blanket forgiveness of PPP loans under $150,000; Wells Fargo struggling to stay under asset cap amid pandemic, CEO says; banks are getting aggressive — and creative — to boost profits; and more from this week's most-read stories.

Bankers said legislative fixes to the small-business rescue program should help more borrowers secure loan forgiveness, though new demand will likely remain tepid because the process is still extremely cumbersome.

Past is not prologue, and a successful strategy for becoming a top-performing bank in 2020 is very different from what it might have been just six months ago.