Journal of Accountancy~ The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) has stopped accepting new Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) applications from most lenders almost a full month before the $292 billion program’s application deadline.
The SBA informed lenders Tuesday afternoon that the PPP general fund was out of money and that the only remaining funds available for new applications are $8 billion set aside for community financial institutions (CFIs), which typically work with businesses in underserved communities. The agency also has set aside $6 billion for PPP applications still in review status or needing more information due to error codes.
Congress in late March extended the PPP application deadline two months to May 31, in part to give the SBA and lenders time to resolve error codes that were holding up nearly 200,000 applications in the SBA’s PPP platform. The unresolved error codes were related to validation checks instituted by the SBA to help prevent fraudulent applications from being funded.
The PPP Extension Act of 2021, P.L. 117-6, did not include any additional funding for the current round of the PPP, which Congress provided with more than $290 billion to make forgivable loans to small businesses and not-for-profits suffering economic loss related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The SBA reported Monday that it had approved more than 5.6 million PPP loans totaling more than $258 billion from the program’s reopening on Jan. 11 through May 2. First-draw PPP loans accounted for $57.3 billion, and second-draw loans totaled nearly $201 billion.
