Fintech company PayPal joins the US Government’s Paycheck Protection Program to lend funds to SMEs and help them sustain amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fintech giant PayPal has collaborated with the US government under its Paycheck Protection Program. Under this initiative, the US government is rolling out loans for small businesses across the US, in a quest to help them survive amid the COVID-19 pandemic and continue paying their employees. In total, it will sanction loans worth $350 billion to qualifying SMEs. With this new partnership, PayPal will also contribute. This makes PayPal one of the first few non-bank organizations to do so.
PayPal confirmed the news through an official announcement. PayPal’s President and CEO, Dan Schulman said that the company is eager to deploy its capital and expertise to help small businesses across America survive these challenging times.
IMPORTANT #PPP UPDATE:
Another ✔️ on PPP “to-do” list:@USTreasury has released new lender application for NON-BANK lenders such as @PayPal & @squareOnce onboard they will substantially increase the ease & availability of #PPPloans for #smallbusiness https://t.co/8qHEr5AABp
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) April 9, 2020
This major partnership comes after US Senator Marco Rubio tweeted that non-banking institutions will be able to participate in the lending process. He directly addressed Square and PayPal in his tweet.
Last week, Square announced that it will allow US citizens to receive their $1200 COVID-19 stimulus directly via Square’s Cash App. Apart from PayPal, other fintech institutes like Biz2Credit, Veem and Kabbage are also a part of the Paycheck Protection program.
Last week, PayPal announced that it will wave off certain fees deferring repayments for its users across the world in order to help them cope financially during this global health crisis.
Schulman acknowledged the fact that small businesses are worst hit by the pandemic in terms of financial stability, and it is extremely important to help them sustain and keep paying salaries to their employees. PayPal claims to have funded $15 billion in loans to more than 300,000 SMEs since 2013.
The global economy has literally come to a standstill amid the COVID shock. Considering the fact that small businesses are the backbone of any economy, it is extremely important to keep them going. Funding initiatives by major fintech companies in this challenging period have definitely come across as some sort of respite.
