JPMorgan Chase Submits Nearly $18B In PPP Loans

JPMorgan Chase & Co. told its small business clients that the New York financial services company has submitted 220,000 applications this week to the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) overseen by the Small Business Administration (SBA).

Reuters reported the information was contained in an email to customers whose loan applications had been submitted.

In total, the investment bank said it provided more than $17.8 billion in relief. The average loan was $81,000, and about half of the applications came from businesses with fewer than five employees, the news service reported.

About 80 percent of the applications were for less than $100,000 while 40 percent were for less than $25,000.

JP Morgan’s email came the same day the U.S. Treasury Department and the SBA temporarily excluded big banks with more than $1 billion in assets from filing applications electronically for the SBA’s PPP for eight hours starting on Wednesday (April 29) at 4 p.m., according to an email obtained by CNBC.

The move was based on the agency’s pledge to “to ensure access to the PPP loan program for the smallest lenders,” according to the email.

“SBA and Treasury will evaluate whether to create a similar reserved time again in the future,” the email said.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has said the program is designed for small businesses, not for public companies that had liquidity.

Mnuchin’s comments followed the second-round launch of $310 billion in PPP funding after the initial $349 billion was depleted in less than two weeks. While the forgivable PPP loans are intended for businesses with less than 500 employees, big companies, public firms and national chains got loans. Some of them returned the money, including the Los Angeles Lakers which gave back $4.6 million, and Shake Shack, which returned its $10 million loan.

And Fiesta Restaurant Group, the parent company of Taco Cabana and Pollo Tropical, revealed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that it will return $15 million in PPP loans. Fiesta had about $160 million in revenue in the fourth quarter of last year, and a market cap in excess of $205 million.