(Reuters) – The Federal Reserve on Tuesday said it had extended the termination date for its Main Street Lending Program to Jan. 8, 2021, from Dec. 31, 2020, to allow more time to process and fund loans submitted to the program’s lender portal on or before Dec. 14.
The extension was approved by U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, the Fed said in a statement.
The emergency program, targeted at small- and mid-sized businesses in need of credit to get through the economic crisis triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, had seen little uptake in the months immediately following its launch in the summer.
But since its termination was announced in November by Mnuchin, volumes have surged and as of Dec. 23, there were $14.59 billion in loans in the facility, more than double the amount at the beginning of December.
(Reporting by Dan Burns; Editing by Paul Simao)
