The Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve building stands in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2020.The Federal Reserve has lowered the barriers on its lending program for smaller businesses as part of an effort to broaden the appeal of the sparsely used facility.
Aimed at helping small- and medium-sized firms get through the Covid-19 pandemic, the program thus far has issued nearly 400 loans for a total of $3.7 billion. The total capacity of the MSLP is $600 billion, thanks to $75 billion in collateral from the Treasury Department that can be leveraged up. The Main Street program is part of a raft of facilities the Fed rolled out shortly following the pandemic escalation in early March.
The other change apart from the minimum loan requirement exempts up to $2 million in PPP loans when computing applicants' debt loads. The Fed also said it is adjusting fees "to encourage the provision of these smaller loans."