PPP Round II
Emailed on April 24th 2020 in The Friday Forward
Yesterday evening, the House passed a $484 billion supplement to the CARES Act, including $321 billion in fresh funds for small businesses through the Paycheck Protection Program.
Expect banks to be under more scrutiny now. Recent reports have exposed how big banks prioritized or offered unfair advantages to wealthy clients to secure PPP loans. Special treatment included “concierge” services and digital HOV lanes that zipped by clogged application portals.
This time around, $60 billion will be set aside for mom-and-pop shops in an effort to avoid V1's favoritism.
Publicly traded companies received almost $600 million in PPP loans—and a very public flogging for doing so. Some recipients, including Shake Shack and the owner of Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse, have agreed to return the money.