Fraudsters potentially stole more than $280 billion COVID-19 relief funding; another $123 billion was wasted or misspent. Combined, the loss represents 10 percent of the $4.2 trillion the U.S. government has so far disbursed in EDIL loans, PPP loan and other COVID relief aid.
Financial technology firms abdicated their responsibility to screen out fraud in applications for a federal program designed to help small businesses stay open and keep workers employed during the pandemic, a report by a House investigations panel said last week.
While the U.S. Small Business Association defended its decision not to collect on small Paycheck Protection Program loans that have defaulted, the agency did agree to assess the costs of its program following criticism of its decision.
A major academic study contends the $800 billion program cost far too much per job saved, and mostly benefited the affluent.
A Stamford man pleaded guilty in federal court last week to providing false information to banks and receiving more than $4 million in Paycheck Protection Program loans.
The U.S. Small Business Administration has received more than 340,000 submissions to its Paycheck Protection Program forgiveness portal since launching the tool two weeks ago for borrowers with PPP loans of $150,000 or less.
The Paycheck Protection Program came to an end on Monday with small businesses affected by the pandemic receiving another $277.7 billion in forgivable loans this year.
The new head of the Small Business Administration says she expects to make changes at the agency that she says will enable it to further help small companies devastated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Emergency Paycheck Protection Program loans made to small businesses during the coronavirus pandemic have been added to a list of government programs considered at high risk of waste, fraud or mismanagement.
President Joe Biden is targeting federal pandemic assistance to the nation’s smallest businesses and taking steps to further racial equity in what is known as the Paycheck Protection Program.
The Biden administration promised Black business executives on Friday that it planned to make sure that the government’s economic support programs were able to reach minority-owned businesses.
The Paycheck Protection Program loan portal will open to lenders with $1 billion in assets or less at 9 a.m. tomorrow, with the remaining lenders gaining access to the portal on Tuesday.
With another round of the Paycheck Protection Program starting this week, lenders will have to manage the process for new loans while still getting through last year’s forgiveness applications.
The next round of Paycheck Protection Program loans will begin on Monday, though not all lenders will have access to the program right away.
Thousands of minority-owned small businesses were at the end of the line in the government’s coronavirus relief program as many struggled to find banks that would accept their applications or were disadvantaged by the terms of the program.
Even as 2020 comes to an end, many of the storylines that dominated the year in banking and lending continue to evolve, likely shaping the industry for months and years to come.
The COVID-19 aid bill passed by Congress on Monday will allow small businesses hit hardest by the pandemic to take a second Paycheck Protection Program loan.
As another wave of COVID-19 cases threatens to deepen the nation’s twin public health and economic crises, Connecticut community banks and credit unions continue to face uncertainties about how the coronavirus could affect their institutions.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Thursday that the government’s top priorities in any new economic relief package should be to provide affordable loans to small businesses and further support for millions of Americans still unemployed.
