Where Credit's Due Ep.2: SMB lending with PayPal and Square




Tearsheet Podcast: Exploring Financial Services Together show

Summary: Today we’ll be talking about the small and medium sized business sector and how it’s becoming increasingly supported by digital lenders. Securing loans from traditional banks is very tough for SMBs – it’s a long and complicated process and it’s not that likely they’ll get the cash they need – only 15% of small business applications get approved at big banks, for example. This is another reason why digital players like Square and PayPal are able to be some of the largest SMB lenders in the US, giving out billions of dollars in loans to the small business sector in 2021. And THAT is a reason why the two companies are my guests today - I talk to Luke Voiles, general manager at Square Banking, and Bernardo Martinez, vice president of Global Merchant Lending at PayPal - to hear their thoughts on small business lending.