{"id":385452,"date":"2023-02-16T06:06:42","date_gmt":"2023-02-15T20:06:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=385452"},"modified":"2023-02-16T06:06:42","modified_gmt":"2023-02-15T20:06:42","slug":"nmi-close-to-being-approved-to-execute-small-biz-loan-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/nmi-close-to-being-approved-to-execute-small-biz-loan-program\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018NMI close to being approved to execute small biz loan program\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Members of the Saipan\u2019s Rotary Club pose with Department of Commerce\u2019s Economic Development officer Kioshi Cody after his presentation at the club\u2019s luncheon last Tuesday at the Hyatt Regency Saipan. (CHRYSTAL MARINO)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

At this point, the CNMI is close to being approved to implement the State Small Business Credit Initiative, which is a loan program intended for microbusinesses in the CNMI, according to CNMI Department of Commerce\u2019s Economic Development officer Kioshi Cody.<\/p>\n

In his presentation to the Rotary Club of Saipan last Tuesday, he said he feels the CNMI is about 99% approved to implement the loan program, which will total $57 million in all, to be issued in three tranches by the U.S. Treasury.<\/p>\n

The disclosed Tuesday that the $57 million State Small Business Credit Initiative for the CNMI is already about 99.9% approved.<\/p>\n

Cody later explained that the CNMI\u2019s share is part of the $10 billion that the U.S. Treasury has allocated to all the states, territories and tribal governments to get capital lending to underserved entrepreneurs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey also have a very specific emphasis on what they call very small businesses, which is businesses with under eight employees. So they want to make sure that all of us are driving it into the sole proprietors hands with a couple of employees; but they are really targeting what we all consider small businesses,\u201d Cody added. \u201cWe are really excited because the CNMI is just one big underserved area, so everyone\u2019s going to be allowed to apply for this.\u201d<\/p>\n

An individual does not have to be a U.S. citizen for them to be eligible for this program. \u201cUnlike [the Small Business Administration], where you have to be a U.S. citizen [or] green card holder\u2026anyone\u2019s open as long as you go through the banks for their underwriting, and 90% of that money stays within our economy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

As well as being open to anyone, the program is especially aimed toward very small businesses, with as low as eight employees.<\/p>\n

Cody said the State Small Business Credit Initiative will be a type of loan\/credit. \u201cIt\u2019s going to go through the participating banks, and what separates that from, say, traditional lending, is if you have a high-risk borrower, banks are just going to say \u2018no.\u2019 That\u2019s it. There\u2019s nothing they can do, [whereas with the] SSBCI, we can contribute up to 50% of the loan. So a bank will be able to say, \u2018Hey we got a risky borrower, Commerce, if you can offset 50% of this loan, we will assume half the risk if you will take on half the risk.\u2019 And this should push it more into businesses that normally would\u2019ve gotten just a hard no.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cody explained that the $57 million will be given in intervals, with a three-year gap between each tranche. \u201cSo they\u2019re going to give it to us in three different [tranches]: $18 million is the first bag of money we get. In three years we get another $18 million. But if we don\u2019t get into it, we lose it. In six years we have to get into that first tranche or we lose it. So they definitely designed the program that we have to move this money as quickly as possible. We\u2019re not just going to sit on it\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Cody stated that the U.S. Treasury are currently looking over the CNMI\u2019s fiscal 2020 audit report, and will be contacting them this Thursday about it. \u201cSo we\u2019re just kind of bracing for them to review all 200-plus pages and come back to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

As to when he expects the CNMI to implement the program, Cody said it will either be in late February or early March. \u201cI just don\u2019t want to commit to late February because as far as I can tell, we only need one or two more pieces. Maybe it\u2019s late February, hopefully it\u2019s early March.\u201d He assured, though that the U.S. Economic Development Administration and the Commerce Department have been focused and energetic \u201cin moving this as quickly as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cody said that, once the CNMI gets the green light, the U.S. Treasury will wire the first $18 million and they have 30 days to start deploying that. \u201cThere\u2019s no sitting on this money and taking your time\u2014no\u2014it\u2019s \u2018you get it, you better start using it, and you got three years to get into the next one, or we take it away.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re a small business, now you have access to capital that [and] we can work with you. \u2026You don\u2019t know how to write a business plan? We can pay someone to\u2026write that for you. You don\u2019t know if you should be a sole proprietor or an LLC, what\u2019s the risk and reward? We\u2019ll help you talk to a lawyer.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut for the most part, for what people want to do here? It\u2019s going to be fair game\u2026and we\u2019re really excited that there\u2019s no citizenship required, because now we\u2019re going look at translating brochures into Tagalog, Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Chamorro and Carolinian, so we can really get this out and push it on all three islands.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026It\u2019s going to be a really exciting time, especially with the state of the economy,\u201d Cody added. \u201cThe key piece is, of course, they want us to be responsible stewards for the $57 million over the next 10 years, but the biggest piece right now is they\u2019re taking a look at our 2020 single audit and if they have any concerns, we\u2019ll find out on Thursday on our next phone call and then we\u2019ll be able to see what we can do to resolve that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At this point, the CNMI is close to being approved to implement the State Small…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":385474,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-385452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=385452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/385474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=385452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=385452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=385452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}