CSBJ Daily

As the economy began to slow last year, large corporations were forced to rely on internally generated money instead of outside investments, but small businesses were forced to seek more loans.

During 2007, small businesses received 13.7 percent more “micro loans,” those less than $100,000. Such loans also increased in total dollar value by 9.4 percent, according to a Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy report released this week.

Small business loans less than $1 million increased 15 percent between June 2006 and June 2007, and a subset of loans – those between $100,000 and $1

million – increased more than twice as much, by almost 32 percent.

The total dollar value of small business loans increased by about 8 percent.

All loans saw higher rates of growth than the prior year over year.

A complete ranking of lenders, including prior annual reports, is available at

www.sba.gov/advo/research/lending.html.