Sequestration Should Not Cause Lending Holiday Says SBA

Feb. 21, 2013 - PRLog -- Check out the interview here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Z_aPYkcebTo

Over 100 California SBA lenders attended the Santa Ana SBA Lender Rountable featuring Jeanne Hulit, Associate Administrator for SBA’s Office of Capital Access.

We got to speak with her about what’s going on in Washington.

Bob Coleman: We’re with Jeanne Hulit, the Associate Administrator of the Office of Capital Access; Jeanne, thank you for coming to sunny California. Jeanne, you talked to the Santa Ana District lenders today; you talked about celebrating success.

Jeanne Hulit: We’ve come off a second record year of SBA lending, so we have a lot to celebrate that the SBA played a critical role in helping us get out of the recession.

Bob: Well, we’ve come back, but we haven’t come back all the way in terms of Main Street capital. How bad are the numbers?

Jeanne: Well since the recession started small business loans outstanding are down 17% on the bank’s balance sheets.

Bob: But the good news is if we didn’t have SBA

Jeanne: It would have been a lot worse. $123 billion decline on the bank’s balance sheets; we supported over $100 billion.

Bob: Those are amazing numbers. The last question – we are all concerned about sequestration. We saw some numbers come out of the White House. How does that affect the 7(a) and 504? Are we going to have a lending holiday?

Jeanne: I don’t think we’re going to have a lending holiday based on the volumes we’ve seen so far. I think that will offset the sequestration.

Bob: Jeanne, thank you for coming to California.

Jeanne: Thank you.