17 ms·

Searchable PPP Loan Data

477 points by lgats 6y ago

dvaun 6y ago
Where is this data sourced from? Edit: I tried accessing some common endpoints like /about to see if there are any unlinked pages, but could not find any. Hence why I asked the question.
- lgats 6y ago
  About page is a work-in-progress. Data source is: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance...
  - dvaun 6y ago
    Looks like I edited my comment at the same time that you posted yours. Thanks for the link and confirmation!
  - basch 6y ago
    As long as you have Excel, Sheets, Numbers etc, it's a lot more pleasant to navigate the original csv, with filters, sort, etc.
- cj 6y ago
  The SBA uploaded a database of all recipients to Box yesterday. Direct link: https://sba.app.box.com/s/tvb0v5i57oa8gc6b5dcm9cyw7y2ms6pp https://sba.app.box.com/s/tvb0v5i57oa8gc6b5dcm9cyw7y2ms6pp CNBC article: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/06/coronavirus-stimulus-list-of-ppp-small-business-loan-recipients-released.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/06/coronavirus-stimulus-list-of... It appears the database may include applicants who submitted partial applications but may not have actually received funds. For example, Index Ventures is in the database but claims they didn't take any loans. From the cnbc article: > The venture capital firms Index Ventures and Foundation Capital, along with the scooter company Bird, said that they did not apply for the Payroll Protection Program, despite being listed in the database as having been approved for millions of dollars of funds from banks under that federally run program.
tfandango 6y ago
Just looking through my home town for businesses I know about... A fair number of them I know carried on with business as usual and had no financial problems (one I used to work for). Seems wrong when there are lots of people in the same town lining up outside the unemployment office every day...
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  Because the goal wasn’t to help the people most affected. It was to maintain the socioeconomic order so that people would be incentivized to continue doing menial work for low wages. If you give people at the bottom a choice to not work, by giving them cash directly, then they would have better negotiating power versus employers. The employers would then have to raise wages, and therefore prices. That means consumers who were proportionally consuming more than others have to consume less as more of the wealth goes towards paying higher wages. And we don’t want that as a society. So we make the aid contingent upon an employer who might bless you with a furlough so you can collect the temporary generous unemployment, but also yank it away in case your menial work is necessary and they can go back to paying you near minimum living wages.
  - digitaltrees 6y ago
    I don’t think you can make this argument when at the same time the government was paying an extra $600 per week on top of regular pay for unemployment.
    - lotsofpulp 6y ago
      That’s only if your employer has laid you off. If they continued your employment or called you back to work for $12/hour, you aren’t eligible for unemployment anymore. And if you refuse to go back to work, then you are also not eligible for unemployment benefits.
      - digitaltrees 6y ago
        Many managers like their employees and don’t want to stiff them like that. My point was the argument that the government design PPP as an effort to perpetuate an existing system that reduces employees bargaining power and prefers businesses can’t be supported when the government specifically strengthen employees bargaining power.
floatingatoll 6y ago
OP, could you add to the About page the total amount of loans issued where the loan amount was $150k+? It would provide a lot of context for this data.
unethical_ban 6y ago
There are several scenarios that frustrate me. Examples like law firms or physicians' offices. These are relatively small firms with very wealthy principals. They are asking for taxpayer money to maintain their wealthy lifestyles, so they don't have to sacrifice their Bentleys to pay staffers. Examples: Thomas J Henry in San Antonio. LLCs and franchisees that probably have millions of dollars in holdings and cash, but act under the guise of "small business" because they operate fast food or something. Religious organizations. It's one thing if something like a local YMCA gets funds, but a church outright getting funds without proving it is going to public services (why don't we just have better public services?) is not proper. Churches already don't pay taxes.
- pkulak 6y ago
  Those things only frustrate me if they aren't loans, which they would be, right?
  - dave5104 6y ago
    Kinda sorta loans. They're made to be forgiven if: > The Paycheck Protection Program is a loan designed to provide a direct incentive for small businesses to keep their workers on the payroll. SBA will forgive loans if all employee retention criteria are met, and the funds are used for eligible expenses. https://www.sba.gov/funding-programs/loans/coronavirus-relief-options/paycheck-protection-program https://www.sba.gov/funding-programs/loans/coronavirus-relie...
  - stefan_ 6y ago
    They are forgiven if you use them to fund payroll, rent, mortgage interest, or utilities.
    - baby 6y ago
      They're also forgiven if your company goes bankrupt IIUC.
  - verall 6y ago
    But there's still not enough of those loans to go round, so it is still very meaningful who gets them.
greatwave1 6y ago
I'm working on a dashboard to map each of these loans geographically: https://www.quiverquant.com/sources/sbaloans https://www.quiverquant.com/sources/sbaloans It's a slow process (as I've been respectful of the rate-limit on the reverse geocoding API I'm using), but I finished mapping four states and hope to complete the other 46 by the end of this week.
- polote 6y ago
  Did you try to use the openstreemap database locally ? http://nominatim.org/release-docs/latest/admin/Installation/ http://nominatim.org/release-docs/latest/admin/Installation/
- c0nsumer 6y ago
  How about adding something to the page itself about completion status? I went and looked, before reading your second paragraph, and the clusters immediately jumped out, and it either seemed suspect or wrong. Then I had to come back here to see why it was wrong.
  - greatwave1 6y ago
    Good idea, just added!
- antisthenes 6y ago
  Wouldn't you just end up with a population density map? Cool project though.
  - fullshark 6y ago
    Yeah i'd try to normalize somehow to get a sense if a geographic area over or underutilized the program compared to expectation.
  - greatwave1 6y ago
    My goal for this map was a tool to search for PPP recipients within your own neighborhood. You're right that it would be interesting to do analysis on population-adjusted loan amounts for different regions... maybe something like a loan $ per capita map?
bengotow 6y ago
This is great! I wish it was searchable by bank though. I heard that a local bank was making some interesting choices about who they helped through the PPP program and I'd love to pull up all the results by Lender.
- graton 6y ago
  You can download the CSV and search it yourself: https://sba.app.box.com/s/wz72fqag1nd99kj3t9xlq49deoop6gzf https://sba.app.box.com/s/wz72fqag1nd99kj3t9xlq49deoop6gzf Linked from this page: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance...
- lgats 6y ago
  http://pppreport.org/bank.php http://pppreport.org/bank.php
- simonw 6y ago
  My version of this here lets you search by bank: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Lender https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Le... You'll need to click on the ID link and then click to see the loans from that institution - e.g. from https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Lender/126 https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Le...
kumarm 6y ago
This great. This is going to really bring out some interesting facts. Looks like even Adult Entertainment businesses got money through Paycheck Protection Program. Example: https://pppreport.org/company/11000+reeder+l+l+c https://pppreport.org/company/11000+reeder+l+l+c
- eli 6y ago
  I don’t get the significance. They are businesses too, no?
- jaywalk 6y ago
  They have had to completely shut down in many places. They are legal businesses like any other, so why shouldn't they get PPP funds like any other business?
  - phonon 6y ago
    They were initially ineligible. https://www.natlawreview.com/article/federal-courts-side-strip-clubs-opposing-sba-s-ineligibility-rules-paycheck https://www.natlawreview.com/article/federal-courts-side-str...
    - jaywalk 6y ago
      I remember that, and it was wrong to keep them out. The courts got it right.
ethagknight 6y ago
What do the letters next to the loan amount mean?
- fullstop 6y ago
  I am guessing that it was the letter code entered on the application form.
graton 6y ago
I was surprised that O'Reilly had a loan for $5-$10 million. https://pppreport.org/company/o+reilly+media+inc https://pppreport.org/company/o+reilly+media+inc They seem like a company where most people can work from home. EDIT: I totally forgot about their conference business. That makes more sense.
- MattGaiser 6y ago
  I think they have live trainers and a fair bit of conference business as well.
- bjt 6y ago
  Their conferences business took a huge hit.
  - toby 6y ago
    Huge hit is a bit of an understatement... they've cancelled all future conferences, likely permanently
    - pgwhalen 6y ago
      Why permanently?
      - lmeyerov 6y ago
        The people who built it up are now gone
- Shank 6y ago
  > They seem like a company where most people can work from home. That's probably true, but the PPP loan covers economic impacts as a result of COVID-19, which can be things like "nobody wants to buy our books that are primarily sold as training materials." 340 people might include sales or actual book production, but it's hard to say without more transparency what the money actually went to/for.
mattbeckman 6y ago
You can get a $5-10 Million loan for 14 employees at a nail salon? https://pppreport.org/company/snappy+nails+s+p+a+9+inc https://pppreport.org/company/snappy+nails+s+p+a+9+inc Damn.
- rco8786 6y ago
  Worth noting that they will owe this back unless they can show it was used for payroll purposes. How they got that much money in the first place is a definite mystery though.
  - sriram_sun 6y ago
    What if they go bankrupt after generously paying employees?
    - kradroy 6y ago
      That would be considered "mala fides" and the court would likely hold the officers/directors liable for the loan amount. Also, prior to filing for bankruptcy any attorney worth his spit will advise his client to fully repay or continue paying obligations to the US government. US government-backed loans are very difficult to completely discharge in a bankruptcy.
  - tfandango 6y ago
    perhaps it encoded in the PPP law, but I wonder if this could be sidetracked by bookeeping, using PPP money to pay people, and investing that money you would have used toward R&D or something.
    - gowld 6y ago
      Of course. That's what the huge scandal is about. $Billions going to wealthy political insiders who don't need it to pay furloughed employees.
  - fullstop 6y ago
    How does this actually work? Is this effectively "Free Payroll" for a few months or is it more complicated than that?
bennylope 6y ago
simonw published a searchable copy of this via Datasette: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com You can filter by state, city, zipcode, bank, business type, and search by employer name, e.g. https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/foia_150k_plus?_search=Ayn+Rand&_sort=rowid https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/fo...
css 6y ago
Kinda funny seeing how investment management firms [0] (mis)use this [1]. [0]: https://pppreport.org/company/gerber+kawasaki+inc https://pppreport.org/company/gerber+kawasaki+inc [1]: https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=441228 https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=441228
llamataboot 6y ago
I really think we should not call these loans, as that obscures what they are. Like it or not, the vast majority of these will be forgiven. We could argue that it was a good use a stimulus funds, or a bad use, but it was basically fre money funneled through businesses in a fairly un-transparent way. Of particular reference here - startups that laid off employees and /then/ applied for a PPP loan https://layoffs.fyi/2020/07/06/these-startups-received-ppp-bailout-loans-but-still-laid-off-employees/ https://layoffs.fyi/2020/07/06/these-startups-received-ppp-b...
- JackFr 6y ago
  It's really not stimulus either. It's more correctly characterized as relief.
- ocdtrekkie 6y ago
  Arguably it's a pretty transparent way: We're looking at a database of companies that got them.
  - xenospn 6y ago
    After they already got them.
    - otoburb 6y ago
      Better late than never? Some level of open retrospective analysis might allow for more carefully crafted policies in the future.
    - digitaltrees 6y ago
      We don’t know anything about their business. For all we know PPP prevented 100% layoffs and a company shutting down. Recruiting and hiring is hard. No one wants to lay people off. The rules of PPP also require maintaining the same number of full time employees in order to receive full forgiveness. Any company that received funds and then reduced staff will not have full amount forgivable.
- 6y ago
chejazi 6y ago
Anyone know the reasoning for the $150k cutoff?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- knowhy 6y ago
  The raw data for loans under $150k seem to be here: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance... https://pppreport.org/about.php https://pppreport.org/about.php > Details for loans under $150,000 remain mostly private, though industry codes and issuing bank details are available.
schoolornot 6y ago
Of all types of institutions, why should we be giving the banks the right to decide which businesses should be recession proof or not? Personal opinion but I would have required the applicants of these quasi-forgiveness loans to give up 35% of their businesses to the state/county/federal inclusive of all assets and investments non-dischargeable by bankruptcy. We have 100,000 people dead in this country, million dollar hospital bills for those on vents, and yet the stream of cash continues to flow to those too stupid to save a few months of operating expenses/payroll. What a trash society the US has become.
- mywittyname 6y ago
  >and yet the stream of cash continues to flow to those too stupid to save a few months of operating expenses/payroll. That's a bit of a harsh take. Lots of businesses took out these loans preemptively because they knew the money would dry up soon. Both the company I work for and our family business had applications ready to go the minute they could be filed because it was clear that the application process was going to be a mess. I agree with you that the forgiveness should be tied to an ownership stake in the business, and that dispersal of funds should have only happened with demonstrable need of funds. But the people involved knew this was going to be a handout and acted accordingly. Taking these funds is an indicator of good business sense, not poor.
- twblalock 6y ago
  > yet the stream of cash continues to flow to those too stupid to save a few months of operating expenses/payroll If I was running a business and the government told me it was illegal for me to make money for the forseeable future, I would damn well want them to compensate me for that.
- basch 6y ago
  I would guess the logic was somewhere around KYC. Businesses have relationships with their banks, and the easiest way to be guided through the process was going to your local rep. Banks would be much better at determining "do we already have an established business relationship with this legit business" vs the federal government trying to determine "which businesses are fake or frauds." It was a way to distribute the verification workload.
nodesocket 6y ago
I live in Nashville, and a lot of the places as to be expected are bars and restaurants. https://pppreport.org/location/TN/NASHVILLE https://pppreport.org/location/TN/NASHVILLE
earthscienceman 6y ago
I love that an official SBA/federal release can have a file titled: "PPP loan data key things to keep in mind FINAL- Sunday.pdf". Nothing says "over-it" like all caps "FINAL-Sunday". Also, maybe even funnier, is that the "Ayn Rand Institute" applied for a loan... that's the best thing in the database I've found so far.
- reaperducer 6y ago
  It doesn't say "over it." It means it's the final revision. This is very common terminology among people who prepare documents like journalists, editors, public relations, etc...
  - robbyt 6y ago
    Also, working on a government project on a Sunday is very common for people who probably do not like their job.
- koolba 6y ago
  I find it funnier than whoever created the zip file also included all the OSX garbage metadata files in __MACOSX as well.
- abtinf 6y ago
  ARI has posted their view on this: https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-it-again/ https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-...
svachalek 6y ago
Hmm, right at the top, 4 loans to 4 different businesses through 3 different banks to a residential address, including "venture capital" and "investment empire". https://pppreport.org/location/CA/CAMPBELL https://pppreport.org/location/CA/CAMPBELL Most of the rest here look pretty legit as far as I can tell. The carwash got 3 loans which seems a little fishy? but to be fair they are a very busy one with a lot of employees.
koolba 6y ago
Per https://pppreport.org/company/y+combinator+research+inc https://pppreport.org/company/y+combinator+research+inc > We found 1 loan(s) for Y Combinator Research Inc meeting or exceeding the public reporting minimum of $150k. > Loan Amount Range $150,000-350,000 > Business Name as Filed Y COMBINATOR RESEARCH, INC. Is YC Research an entirely separate entity from YC core?
- spocklivelong 6y ago
  Why is it listed as a Non-profit?
  - cj 6y ago
    Looks like YC Research is no longer affiliated with Y Combinator, and has been renamed to OpenResearch. I wouldn't be surprised if their legal entity name hasn't changed from the original. https://blog.ycombinator.com/yc-research/ https://blog.ycombinator.com/yc-research/
  - cosmie 6y ago
    Because Y Combinator Research is a non-profit[1]. That said, it's apparently no longer associated with Y Combinator, and goes by OpenResearch now[2]. [1] https://www.guidestar.org/profile/81-0861414 https://www.guidestar.org/profile/81-0861414 [2] https://ycr.org/ https://ycr.org/
Amorymeltzer 6y ago
Peripherally related, but this tweet by @dataeditor at the Washington Post was amusing (https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280278987797942272 https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280278987797942272): >Philadelphia, to its own credit, is spelled at least 57 different ways in the PPP loan data (an image is included, with various items, such as "PHIADELPHIA", "PHILADELPHIA,", and "PHILLY") Pretty well sums up data science. He also notes that Chicago is spelled 31 ways (https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280277322596311041 https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280277322596311041).
- dfxm12 6y ago
  I wonder if learning how to spell Philadelphia, Pennsylvania correctly at a young age must make one better at spelling than just having to to write something easier, like New York, New York.
- cjlars 6y ago
  Data's all sorts of messed up in this. My friend's company is in this and 3 columns are flat out wrong and different from what he submitted. There's only 7 applicant submitted columns! But remember where it came from: thousands of lenders hand keying this stuff in with minimal guidance.
eric_b 6y ago
So many complaints here. Based on the comments I think there is some misunderstanding about the nuts and bolts of this program. These are loans. They are two year low interest loans. They have to be paid back unless some or all is forgiven. Forgiveness requires documentation on employees retained, wage history, and is capped at $20k/employee maximum. And of course a piece of that comes back to the government in terms of payroll taxes. Just because a company took a 1M loan, doesn't mean it will be 100% forgiven. For those complaining the companies don't "need" the money - I know many households who received $4k+ in stimulus checks that didn't need it. Should they not have taken it? And anyways, the whole point of this program was to get money to businesses quickly. Means testing takes time. Sure there are going to be some questionable loans. Some fraud too. But overall our government has spent a lot more money and gotten worse returns than the PPP.
- ta17711771 6y ago
  > unless some or all is forgiven. RIPE for favoritism, aka, corruption.
  - eric_b 6y ago
    I don't think favoritism is a concern. The forgiveness guidance is not, to my knowledge, finalized. But what we've seen so far is pretty cut and dried. It's possible some people could convince their lender to forgive more than they should - but certainly those meeting the forgiveness criteria will get it. Corruption and fraud are certainly possible - though the lenders got paid from the government just for originating the loans. That is, they already made their money. There's no extra money in them over-forgiving a loan.
    - IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
      Favoritism on the part of banks was real. Source - applicant for 4 separate, PPP loans that were eventually awarded. Banks are not stupid. They awarded funds first to their clients that had outstanding loans with them. That meant the banks' own portfolio was not impaired, thanks to influx of PPP
hardtke 6y ago
My kids' private school recently sent out a $500 per student tuition credit (about $650K for the entire school). I see now that they got a multi million dollar PPP loan (which will be forgiven). Their revenues were unaffected by the epidemic (full enrollment for next year and no plans to rollback the tuition increase).
- eric_b 6y ago
  Unless you can see their books you really have no idea how their revenues did. And you really have no idea what additional expenses they're incurring due to COVID mitigations.
- ryanwaggoner 6y ago
  My kid's private school also got a PPP loan, but I don't begrudge them that at all. They applied for the program according to the rules and they're using that money to pay for necessities. While our school also hasn't (yet) lost much in the way of enrollment, their finances are worse now: - more costs for financial aid - more costs for cleaning and retrofitting facilities - more costs for experts on reopening safely - more costs for online education programs (software, training, etc) - refunds of after-school programs, field trips, etc. - fewer donations from alumni The only thing that's really improved is maybe utilities? They 100% would have laid off teachers if they didn't get the PPP. It's ludicrous that people are begrudging schools for using this program exactly as intended.
mikemac 6y ago
One thing to note is there seems to be a lot of errors in the data. For instance, Bird is in the 5-10M range but claimed it never actually applied. https://www.axios.com/paycheck-protection-program-disclosure-problems-1b1b8f81-b3de-4ec8-bacc-5312ac6d53f3.html https://www.axios.com/paycheck-protection-program-disclosure...
xrd 6y ago
Does anyone know the requirements around getting these loans? For example, if employees were furloughed without pay (but kept healthcare) are they still within bounds of the loan if they indicate they retained the jobs listed?
- ksdale 6y ago
  You don't get forgiveness for wages you don't pay.
  - fullstop 6y ago
    Is there any penalty for increasing wages after receiving the "loan" ?
    - ksdale 6y ago
      Increasing whose wages?
      - fullstop 6y ago
        Those who are having their Paycheck Protected.
    - digitaltrees 6y ago
      It was unclear originally but the SBA issued guidance that this was acceptable. Think about it, isn’t hazard pay for employees coming back to work at risk of Covid exposure ok? Shouldn’t we applaud companies willing to pass PPP to employees? Let’s not be so quick to label everything fraud, or greed. Sure some people will misuse funds. But most wont. Most people are good.
  - xrd 6y ago
    What happens if that happens? What recourse, if any, does an employee have in that case? Is anyone looking out for those cases?
    - 6y ago
heurist 6y ago
Definitely missing some, one of my companies is not listed (sub-$100k loan).
- fullstop 6y ago
  It only includes loans over $150k. edit: I swear I can type
  - georgespencer 6y ago
    > It only includes loans up to $150k Do you mean "over" $150k? Parent's loan was <$150k.
    - fullstop 6y ago
      I did, my mistake.
- mikemac 6y ago
  The Treasury only provided business name data over 150k. You can get the de-identified data by state for loans under 150k: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance...
fullstop 6y ago
Here's a Youth Baseball group which received 5-10 Million: https://pppreport.org/company/lafayette+youth+baseball+association https://pppreport.org/company/lafayette+youth+baseball+assoc... edit: https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=814110 https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=814110 "Private Households"
aazaa 6y ago
It's a little surprising how many are banks. A few random searches showed about 80% of the companies are banks. On reflection, though, not so surprising.
- HaloZero 6y ago
  Huh, I didn't really see that. I did some cursory searches and haven't found a lot of banks. Maybe you're thinking the lender field is the category of the company?
nullc 6y ago
There are a remarkable number of sketchy blockchain companies in this list-- many for larger $5 to $10 million dollar ranges. I wonder how many of them were sitting on millions or tens or even hundreds of millions of deceptively obtained ICO funds at the time they obtained these 'loans'. E.g. I see at least one that raised over 100k BTC in ICO funding just couple years ago.
- vmception 6y ago
  Although ICO purchasers like to imagine they have investments in "not-securities", proper accounting of token sales from the issuer is revenue, and payroll goes to employees. So if they had that revenue and also paid payroll to employees in 2019, they would be eligible. The 2018 ones were screwed though, too far back. They probably exhausted a lot of their runway on marketing and extortionate exchanges. Blockchain community is unique in that they treat $5-10 million raises as "forever money" for an indefinite time period, when even Series A tech companies would not be expected to last more than 15-18 months. So there are a lot of misalignments in that sector, which are poorly understood by both the people in the sector, as well as critics outside of the sector. The issuers themselves often have good legal help and proper accounting, as it is a tricky regulatory environment to begin with, which exacerbates these misalignments with their purchasers and psychological investors.
  - nullc 6y ago
    > often have good legal help That hasn't been my experience, instead my experience is that many of these companies went through large numbers of lawyers who told them what they wanted to do would be likely found to be illegal before finding some that would sign off on it. > "forever money" for an indefinite time period For the most part this is because they don't deliver anything useful, so they won't get any more (at least not until they spin up a new operation under another name). Some of the companies I see in that database have principals who are on their third or more failed blockchain/ico and hey have become exceedingly efficient at it.
    - vmception 6y ago
phreeza 6y ago
https://pppreport.org/company/ayn+rand+institute+center+for+advancement+of+objectivism https://pppreport.org/company/ayn+rand+institute+center+for+...
- abtinf 6y ago
  https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-it-again/ https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-...
hprotagonist 6y ago
Without this program, my employer would have had to either lay off a large group of employees or we would've gone under. As it is, out of a group of about 50, we furloughed 8, who continued without pay, qualified for unemployment benefits, but retained 100% health coverage. Two have returned to work already and we anticipate being more or less normal again in time to meet the loan forgiveness criteria. It's good to have the database open to see -- and, hey, to double-check that we actually got it.
- _curious_ 6y ago
  So will your employer be paying the "loan" back?
  - dopamean 6y ago
    Most of the loan isn't designed to be paid back. So what are you getting at?
    - luckylion 6y ago
      If it's not designed to be paid back, is it a loan? noun: loan; plural noun: loans a thing that is borrowed, especially a sum of money that is expected to be paid back with interest. Is it just called a loan because that sounds better than just calling it a subsidy?
      - dopamean 6y ago
        So the issue is with what the government is calling it?
        luckylion 6y ago
        I believe that's why the parent comment had used quotes. It's not a loan, it's a subsidy. Calling it a loan is misleading, because loans are meant to be paid back, and this isn't.
digitaltrees 6y ago
I think PPP saved the economy. We can scapegoat and find problems. But don’t ignore what would have happened in its absence. Companies would reduce spending at the very least or go out of business at the worst. We would have entered a self reinforcing cycle of reduced spending and purchasing creating a depression.
- uptown 6y ago
  "I think PPP saved the economy." You ain't seen nothing yet.
  - digitaltrees 6y ago
    Only if people criticize these initial attempts and prevent more assistance. Yes. This is going to get worse, but government support could continue.
    - luckylion 6y ago
      That's pretty much what people describe when they say "privatize the profits, socialize the losses", isn't it? And you're already preparing to shift the blame towards the people critical of that approach.
      - digitaltrees 6y ago
        Privatizing profit and socializing losses is better applied to more ordinary situations where ordinary business risk is shifted to the public. Here we are taking about the total possible social loss caused by a pandemic, not ordinary business risk. The point is that in society will be more harmed by inaction than supporting businesses.
- ryanwaggoner 6y ago
  I agree. I'm horrified by the current administration and their handling of the health side of this pandemic, and I'm completely shocked at how well the Federal government and the Federal Reserve have managed the economic side. Between the stimulus checks, the PPP, and the trillions spent by the Federal Reserve to prop up various markets. Yes, many mistakes were made and we'll end up having spent hundreds of billions on fraud and waste, but I don't think people have an inkling of how bad things would have gotten otherwise. All I can say is that I'm glad most of the people commenting here aren't in charge or this country would have completely collapsed. And it still could! I think things will get very dark very fast if Congress doesn't extend at least some of the $600 / week unemployment benefits.
j-c-hewitt 6y ago
Anyone who saw these offers and did not expect the strings attached in terms of government meddling and/or decentralized witch-hunting for taking the money offered was foolish. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.
sajit 6y ago
Admire the transperancy.
thedogeye 6y ago
Not a good look for the Ayn Rand Institute lol
- digitaltrees 6y ago
  Haha. Good find.
- hckr_news 6y ago
  Yeezy as well
- nullc 6y ago
  https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ayn-rand-social-security/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ayn-rand-social-security/
_curious_ 6y ago
How interesting it is...not even through the A's yet in my major city and I am seeing peer companies on here reporting more "jobs retained" than they even employ...if that doesn't indicate what a scam this whole thing is, what would it take to make that clear? Edit to add: further down the list I am seeing tech co's that actually laid off large % of employees that received millions still. They probably were not counting on this information becoming public (though it obviously is/should be by default)...any respect I may have had for them is no more. Disgusting behavior.
chanmad29 6y ago
I hate billionaires not spending this pocket change but depending on government for such loans. But to play devil's advocate, aren't these most/all companies set up as limited liability, and therefore these billionaire owners are absolved of any responsibility to take on such bailouts? So is this moral problem or more a structural problem on how the enterprise is being set up?
- ryanwaggoner 6y ago
  "Billionaires" (or the much, much more common millionaires and hundred-thousand-aires who own most companies) wouldn't "spend the pocket change", they'd just lay people off or furlough them. This program was designed to keep businesses afloat and to keep them from laying off employees. It's a nice idea to think that all these companies would just altruistically keep their employees around doing nothing while they're shut down, but that wouldn't happen.
llacb47 6y ago
I like this better: https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/business/sba-ppp-data/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/business/sba-pp...
unstatusthequo 6y ago
This is great intel for those who will phish the recipients. There’s a point where transparency causes risk...
gm 6y ago
Just so you all know, Twitter's going crazy with the apparent rampant inaccuracy of the database.
- WrongThinkerNo5 6y ago
  Is the complain about the DB of the website or the raw data is inaccurate? The former I can shrug off as insignificant, the latter is mildly terrifying and makes you wonder how the hell we can trust anything the government does when they can't even take care of keeping track of triple billons of dollars of other people's ... namely, people who did not get any stimulus ... money. But I guess the bureaucrats and kleptocratic government must have been ramping it up after the billions upon billions they "lost" in Iraq without a trace. This is probably going to turn into politicians and bureaucrats throwing up their hands when companies claim that the information is inaccurate and they owe nothing and the government cannot prove anything, a la, housing fraud.
simonw 6y ago
I have a Datasette running of this here: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/foia_150k_plus https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/fo... You can run your own SQL queries against it. Here's a query I wrote that shows the most common NAICS codes (industry categorization from the census): https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus?sql=with+counts+as+%28select+NAICSCode%2C+count%28*%29+as+num_loan_recipients+from+foia_150k_plus+group+by+NAICSCode+order+by+num_loan_recipients+desc%29%0D%0Aselect+counts.NAICSCode%2C+counts.num_loan_recipients%2C+naics_2017.name%2C+%27https%3A%2F%2Fsba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com%2Floans_150k_plus%2Ffoia_150k_plus%3F_facet%3DCity%26_facet%3DState%26_facet%3DRaceEthnicity%26_facet%3DBusinessType%26_facet%3DGender%26_facet%3DVeteran%26NAICSCode%3D%27+%7C%7C+NAICSCode+as+view_them+from+counts+join+naics_2017+on+counts.NAICSCode+%3D+naics_2017.id https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus?sq... You can click through from there to get faceted search of e.g. every loan made to a dentist: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/foia_150k_plus?_facet=City&_facet=State&_facet=RaceEthnicity&_facet=BusinessType&_facet=Gender&_facet=Veteran&NAICSCode=621210 https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/fo... I have full notes about how I built this here: https://github.com/simonw/sba-loans-covid-19-datasette https://github.com/simonw/sba-loans-covid-19-datasette
lgats 6y ago
For some more digging, here is a list of S.E.C. registered companies loosely matched to the dataset using the company name: https://pppreport.org/sec.php https://pppreport.org/sec.php -list contains any company with a ticker [current/previous OTC stock or other] -likely to contain many false associations, but still full of surprises $NTN, $6.3m Market Cap $TRNF, $22m Market Cap $FAT, $40m Market Cap each received 1-2 million in PPP
bl4ckneon 6y ago
Something I find amusing is the amount of miss spellings for some bigger cities. San Francisco is spelled around 10 different ways. You think people would spell check the city they live in before asking for hundreds of thousands of dollars or more...
I_am_tiberius 6y ago
I'm wondering why Saas companies like "CODA PROJECT INC" are on that list. I would have assumed they are not effected by the corona crisis. I thought they would benefit from it.
- albntomat0 6y ago
  If their customers have significantly reduced income due to the pandemic, SaaS companies will get hit as well, even if they work from home, and their immediate customers (other businesses) do so as well.
hownottowrite 6y ago
The purpose of the Paycheck Protection Program is to keep people off of unemployment. The type of company taking the loan really doesn’t matter. Revenues don’t matter. What matters is that they have the employees (salary) to justify the funds. Forgiveness will be granted when they demonstrate they’ve kept their staffing levels the same. The whole thing is designed to prevent even more job losses. That’s it.
rakjosh 6y ago
I was working on a similar website :) https://ppp-loan.info/ https://ppp-loan.info/
raviolo 6y ago
So, what if a business was successful, not impacted by covid, and wasn’t planning to lay off any employees anyway? Say, technology consulting company with 100 employees. Took out a PPP “loan”, which will be promptly forgiven since they keep the staff, who gets to keep the money? Something tells me 100% goes to business owner and 0% to employees. I think there are quite a few companies like this. Hence “money goes to those who least need it”.
- zzleeper 6y ago
  You are exactly right. In fact, I know of a few businesses that actually had MORE business (wholesalers), and the CEO of one told my friend that he was just going to use the money to buy his wife a new Porsche. This is anecdotal for sure, but there is no reason why firms wouldn't rely on free money as long as they are amoral enough. If I had implemented the plan, I would have just created a program where the program only covered a % of the wages (say 80% instead of 100%) and mostly only for people who were not able to work. Of course, that brings other problems, but there is a middle ground somewhere in there.
  - raviolo 6y ago
    And I know a business owner who is shopping for a new house after getting a PPP “loan”. Sure, PPP money is supposed to be used for payroll. No problem, one can indeed use PPP money for payroll 100%. But then use the business revenue, 90% of which would normally be used for payroll, to take out a nice bonus and buy a house.
dsalzman 6y ago
I made a graphical map of this PPP data. Here https://www.dannysalzman.com/2020/07/07/map-of-ppp-funding https://www.dannysalzman.com/2020/07/07/map-of-ppp-funding Full screen - https://www.dannysalzman.com/files/ppp_map_v1 https://www.dannysalzman.com/files/ppp_map_v1 Warning - large file download (128mb) doesn't work well on mobile
downvoteme1 6y ago
I have a question that somebody more knowledgeable can answer. My company, a recruitment agency, took 2 to 5 million in these loans and kept me hired . But since my main client kept me hired , the recruitment agency kept paying me. So did this recruitment agency just make 2-5 million in free money - just by proving that they ran my payroll- which they did. because the client kept me hired anyway.

477 points by lgats 6y ago

Where is this data sourced from? Edit: I tried accessing some common endpoints like /about to see if there are any unlinked pages, but could not find any. Hence why I asked the question.

lgats 6y ago
About page is a work-in-progress. Data source is: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance...
- dvaun 6y ago
  Looks like I edited my comment at the same time that you posted yours. Thanks for the link and confirmation!
- basch 6y ago
  As long as you have Excel, Sheets, Numbers etc, it's a lot more pleasant to navigate the original csv, with filters, sort, etc.
cj 6y ago
The SBA uploaded a database of all recipients to Box yesterday. Direct link: https://sba.app.box.com/s/tvb0v5i57oa8gc6b5dcm9cyw7y2ms6pp https://sba.app.box.com/s/tvb0v5i57oa8gc6b5dcm9cyw7y2ms6pp CNBC article: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/06/coronavirus-stimulus-list-of-ppp-small-business-loan-recipients-released.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/06/coronavirus-stimulus-list-of... It appears the database may include applicants who submitted partial applications but may not have actually received funds. For example, Index Ventures is in the database but claims they didn't take any loans. From the cnbc article: > The venture capital firms Index Ventures and Foundation Capital, along with the scooter company Bird, said that they did not apply for the Payroll Protection Program, despite being listed in the database as having been approved for millions of dollars of funds from banks under that federally run program.

tfandango 6y ago

Just looking through my home town for businesses I know about... A fair number of them I know carried on with business as usual and had no financial problems (one I used to work for). Seems wrong when there are lots of people in the same town lining up outside the unemployment office every day...

lotsofpulp 6y ago
Because the goal wasn’t to help the people most affected. It was to maintain the socioeconomic order so that people would be incentivized to continue doing menial work for low wages. If you give people at the bottom a choice to not work, by giving them cash directly, then they would have better negotiating power versus employers. The employers would then have to raise wages, and therefore prices. That means consumers who were proportionally consuming more than others have to consume less as more of the wealth goes towards paying higher wages. And we don’t want that as a society. So we make the aid contingent upon an employer who might bless you with a furlough so you can collect the temporary generous unemployment, but also yank it away in case your menial work is necessary and they can go back to paying you near minimum living wages.
- digitaltrees 6y ago
  I don’t think you can make this argument when at the same time the government was paying an extra $600 per week on top of regular pay for unemployment.
  - lotsofpulp 6y ago
    That’s only if your employer has laid you off. If they continued your employment or called you back to work for $12/hour, you aren’t eligible for unemployment anymore. And if you refuse to go back to work, then you are also not eligible for unemployment benefits.
    - digitaltrees 6y ago
      Many managers like their employees and don’t want to stiff them like that. My point was the argument that the government design PPP as an effort to perpetuate an existing system that reduces employees bargaining power and prefers businesses can’t be supported when the government specifically strengthen employees bargaining power.

floatingatoll 6y ago

OP, could you add to the About page the total amount of loans issued where the loan amount was $150k+? It would provide a lot of context for this data.

unethical_ban 6y ago

There are several scenarios that frustrate me. Examples like law firms or physicians' offices. These are relatively small firms with very wealthy principals. They are asking for taxpayer money to maintain their wealthy lifestyles, so they don't have to sacrifice their Bentleys to pay staffers. Examples: Thomas J Henry in San Antonio. LLCs and franchisees that probably have millions of dollars in holdings and cash, but act under the guise of "small business" because they operate fast food or something. Religious organizations. It's one thing if something like a local YMCA gets funds, but a church outright getting funds without proving it is going to public services (why don't we just have better public services?) is not proper. Churches already don't pay taxes.

pkulak 6y ago
Those things only frustrate me if they aren't loans, which they would be, right?
- dave5104 6y ago
  Kinda sorta loans. They're made to be forgiven if: > The Paycheck Protection Program is a loan designed to provide a direct incentive for small businesses to keep their workers on the payroll. SBA will forgive loans if all employee retention criteria are met, and the funds are used for eligible expenses. https://www.sba.gov/funding-programs/loans/coronavirus-relief-options/paycheck-protection-program https://www.sba.gov/funding-programs/loans/coronavirus-relie...
- stefan_ 6y ago
  They are forgiven if you use them to fund payroll, rent, mortgage interest, or utilities.
  - baby 6y ago
    They're also forgiven if your company goes bankrupt IIUC.
- verall 6y ago
  But there's still not enough of those loans to go round, so it is still very meaningful who gets them.

greatwave1 6y ago

I'm working on a dashboard to map each of these loans geographically: https://www.quiverquant.com/sources/sbaloans https://www.quiverquant.com/sources/sbaloans It's a slow process (as I've been respectful of the rate-limit on the reverse geocoding API I'm using), but I finished mapping four states and hope to complete the other 46 by the end of this week.

polote 6y ago
Did you try to use the openstreemap database locally ? http://nominatim.org/release-docs/latest/admin/Installation/ http://nominatim.org/release-docs/latest/admin/Installation/
c0nsumer 6y ago
How about adding something to the page itself about completion status? I went and looked, before reading your second paragraph, and the clusters immediately jumped out, and it either seemed suspect or wrong. Then I had to come back here to see why it was wrong.
- greatwave1 6y ago
  Good idea, just added!
antisthenes 6y ago
Wouldn't you just end up with a population density map? Cool project though.
- fullshark 6y ago
  Yeah i'd try to normalize somehow to get a sense if a geographic area over or underutilized the program compared to expectation.
- greatwave1 6y ago
  My goal for this map was a tool to search for PPP recipients within your own neighborhood. You're right that it would be interesting to do analysis on population-adjusted loan amounts for different regions... maybe something like a loan $ per capita map?

bengotow 6y ago

This is great! I wish it was searchable by bank though. I heard that a local bank was making some interesting choices about who they helped through the PPP program and I'd love to pull up all the results by Lender.

graton 6y ago
You can download the CSV and search it yourself: https://sba.app.box.com/s/wz72fqag1nd99kj3t9xlq49deoop6gzf https://sba.app.box.com/s/wz72fqag1nd99kj3t9xlq49deoop6gzf Linked from this page: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance...
lgats 6y ago
http://pppreport.org/bank.php http://pppreport.org/bank.php
simonw 6y ago
My version of this here lets you search by bank: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Lender https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Le... You'll need to click on the ID link and then click to see the loans from that institution - e.g. from https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Lender/126 https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/Le...

kumarm 6y ago

This great. This is going to really bring out some interesting facts. Looks like even Adult Entertainment businesses got money through Paycheck Protection Program. Example: https://pppreport.org/company/11000+reeder+l+l+c https://pppreport.org/company/11000+reeder+l+l+c

eli 6y ago
I don’t get the significance. They are businesses too, no?
jaywalk 6y ago
They have had to completely shut down in many places. They are legal businesses like any other, so why shouldn't they get PPP funds like any other business?
- phonon 6y ago
  They were initially ineligible. https://www.natlawreview.com/article/federal-courts-side-strip-clubs-opposing-sba-s-ineligibility-rules-paycheck https://www.natlawreview.com/article/federal-courts-side-str...
  - jaywalk 6y ago
    I remember that, and it was wrong to keep them out. The courts got it right.

ethagknight 6y ago

What do the letters next to the loan amount mean?

fullstop 6y ago
I am guessing that it was the letter code entered on the application form.

graton 6y ago

I was surprised that O'Reilly had a loan for $5-$10 million. https://pppreport.org/company/o+reilly+media+inc https://pppreport.org/company/o+reilly+media+inc They seem like a company where most people can work from home. EDIT: I totally forgot about their conference business. That makes more sense.

MattGaiser 6y ago
I think they have live trainers and a fair bit of conference business as well.
bjt 6y ago
Their conferences business took a huge hit.
- toby 6y ago
  Huge hit is a bit of an understatement... they've cancelled all future conferences, likely permanently
  - pgwhalen 6y ago
    Why permanently?
    - lmeyerov 6y ago
      The people who built it up are now gone
Shank 6y ago
> They seem like a company where most people can work from home. That's probably true, but the PPP loan covers economic impacts as a result of COVID-19, which can be things like "nobody wants to buy our books that are primarily sold as training materials." 340 people might include sales or actual book production, but it's hard to say without more transparency what the money actually went to/for.

mattbeckman 6y ago

You can get a $5-10 Million loan for 14 employees at a nail salon? https://pppreport.org/company/snappy+nails+s+p+a+9+inc https://pppreport.org/company/snappy+nails+s+p+a+9+inc Damn.

rco8786 6y ago
Worth noting that they will owe this back unless they can show it was used for payroll purposes. How they got that much money in the first place is a definite mystery though.
- sriram_sun 6y ago
  What if they go bankrupt after generously paying employees?
  - kradroy 6y ago
    That would be considered "mala fides" and the court would likely hold the officers/directors liable for the loan amount. Also, prior to filing for bankruptcy any attorney worth his spit will advise his client to fully repay or continue paying obligations to the US government. US government-backed loans are very difficult to completely discharge in a bankruptcy.
- tfandango 6y ago
  perhaps it encoded in the PPP law, but I wonder if this could be sidetracked by bookeeping, using PPP money to pay people, and investing that money you would have used toward R&D or something.
  - gowld 6y ago
    Of course. That's what the huge scandal is about. $Billions going to wealthy political insiders who don't need it to pay furloughed employees.
- fullstop 6y ago
  How does this actually work? Is this effectively "Free Payroll" for a few months or is it more complicated than that?

bennylope 6y ago

simonw published a searchable copy of this via Datasette: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com You can filter by state, city, zipcode, bank, business type, and search by employer name, e.g. https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/foia_150k_plus?_search=Ayn+Rand&_sort=rowid https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/fo...

css 6y ago

Kinda funny seeing how investment management firms [0] (mis)use this [1]. [0]: https://pppreport.org/company/gerber+kawasaki+inc https://pppreport.org/company/gerber+kawasaki+inc [1]: https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=441228 https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=441228

llamataboot 6y ago

I really think we should not call these loans, as that obscures what they are. Like it or not, the vast majority of these will be forgiven. We could argue that it was a good use a stimulus funds, or a bad use, but it was basically fre money funneled through businesses in a fairly un-transparent way. Of particular reference here - startups that laid off employees and /then/ applied for a PPP loan https://layoffs.fyi/2020/07/06/these-startups-received-ppp-bailout-loans-but-still-laid-off-employees/ https://layoffs.fyi/2020/07/06/these-startups-received-ppp-b...

JackFr 6y ago
It's really not stimulus either. It's more correctly characterized as relief.
ocdtrekkie 6y ago
Arguably it's a pretty transparent way: We're looking at a database of companies that got them.
- xenospn 6y ago
  After they already got them.
  - otoburb 6y ago
    Better late than never? Some level of open retrospective analysis might allow for more carefully crafted policies in the future.
  - digitaltrees 6y ago
    We don’t know anything about their business. For all we know PPP prevented 100% layoffs and a company shutting down. Recruiting and hiring is hard. No one wants to lay people off. The rules of PPP also require maintaining the same number of full time employees in order to receive full forgiveness. Any company that received funds and then reduced staff will not have full amount forgivable.
6y ago

chejazi 6y ago

Anyone know the reasoning for the $150k cutoff?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
knowhy 6y ago
The raw data for loans under $150k seem to be here: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance... https://pppreport.org/about.php https://pppreport.org/about.php > Details for loans under $150,000 remain mostly private, though industry codes and issuing bank details are available.

schoolornot 6y ago

Of all types of institutions, why should we be giving the banks the right to decide which businesses should be recession proof or not? Personal opinion but I would have required the applicants of these quasi-forgiveness loans to give up 35% of their businesses to the state/county/federal inclusive of all assets and investments non-dischargeable by bankruptcy. We have 100,000 people dead in this country, million dollar hospital bills for those on vents, and yet the stream of cash continues to flow to those too stupid to save a few months of operating expenses/payroll. What a trash society the US has become.

mywittyname 6y ago
>and yet the stream of cash continues to flow to those too stupid to save a few months of operating expenses/payroll. That's a bit of a harsh take. Lots of businesses took out these loans preemptively because they knew the money would dry up soon. Both the company I work for and our family business had applications ready to go the minute they could be filed because it was clear that the application process was going to be a mess. I agree with you that the forgiveness should be tied to an ownership stake in the business, and that dispersal of funds should have only happened with demonstrable need of funds. But the people involved knew this was going to be a handout and acted accordingly. Taking these funds is an indicator of good business sense, not poor.
twblalock 6y ago
> yet the stream of cash continues to flow to those too stupid to save a few months of operating expenses/payroll If I was running a business and the government told me it was illegal for me to make money for the forseeable future, I would damn well want them to compensate me for that.
basch 6y ago
I would guess the logic was somewhere around KYC. Businesses have relationships with their banks, and the easiest way to be guided through the process was going to your local rep. Banks would be much better at determining "do we already have an established business relationship with this legit business" vs the federal government trying to determine "which businesses are fake or frauds." It was a way to distribute the verification workload.

nodesocket 6y ago

I live in Nashville, and a lot of the places as to be expected are bars and restaurants. https://pppreport.org/location/TN/NASHVILLE https://pppreport.org/location/TN/NASHVILLE

earthscienceman 6y ago

I love that an official SBA/federal release can have a file titled: "PPP loan data key things to keep in mind FINAL- Sunday.pdf". Nothing says "over-it" like all caps "FINAL-Sunday". Also, maybe even funnier, is that the "Ayn Rand Institute" applied for a loan... that's the best thing in the database I've found so far.

reaperducer 6y ago
It doesn't say "over it." It means it's the final revision. This is very common terminology among people who prepare documents like journalists, editors, public relations, etc...
- robbyt 6y ago
  Also, working on a government project on a Sunday is very common for people who probably do not like their job.
koolba 6y ago
I find it funnier than whoever created the zip file also included all the OSX garbage metadata files in __MACOSX as well.
abtinf 6y ago
ARI has posted their view on this: https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-it-again/ https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-...

svachalek 6y ago

Hmm, right at the top, 4 loans to 4 different businesses through 3 different banks to a residential address, including "venture capital" and "investment empire". https://pppreport.org/location/CA/CAMPBELL https://pppreport.org/location/CA/CAMPBELL Most of the rest here look pretty legit as far as I can tell. The carwash got 3 loans which seems a little fishy? but to be fair they are a very busy one with a lot of employees.

koolba 6y ago

Per https://pppreport.org/company/y+combinator+research+inc https://pppreport.org/company/y+combinator+research+inc > We found 1 loan(s) for Y Combinator Research Inc meeting or exceeding the public reporting minimum of $150k. > Loan Amount Range $150,000-350,000 > Business Name as Filed Y COMBINATOR RESEARCH, INC. Is YC Research an entirely separate entity from YC core?

spocklivelong 6y ago
Why is it listed as a Non-profit?
- cj 6y ago
  Looks like YC Research is no longer affiliated with Y Combinator, and has been renamed to OpenResearch. I wouldn't be surprised if their legal entity name hasn't changed from the original. https://blog.ycombinator.com/yc-research/ https://blog.ycombinator.com/yc-research/
- cosmie 6y ago
  Because Y Combinator Research is a non-profit[1]. That said, it's apparently no longer associated with Y Combinator, and goes by OpenResearch now[2]. [1] https://www.guidestar.org/profile/81-0861414 https://www.guidestar.org/profile/81-0861414 [2] https://ycr.org/ https://ycr.org/

Amorymeltzer 6y ago

Peripherally related, but this tweet by @dataeditor at the Washington Post was amusing (https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280278987797942272 https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280278987797942272): >Philadelphia, to its own credit, is spelled at least 57 different ways in the PPP loan data (an image is included, with various items, such as "PHIADELPHIA", "PHILADELPHIA,", and "PHILLY") Pretty well sums up data science. He also notes that Chicago is spelled 31 ways (https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280277322596311041 https://twitter.com/dataeditor/status/1280277322596311041).

dfxm12 6y ago
I wonder if learning how to spell Philadelphia, Pennsylvania correctly at a young age must make one better at spelling than just having to to write something easier, like New York, New York.
cjlars 6y ago
Data's all sorts of messed up in this. My friend's company is in this and 3 columns are flat out wrong and different from what he submitted. There's only 7 applicant submitted columns! But remember where it came from: thousands of lenders hand keying this stuff in with minimal guidance.

eric_b 6y ago

So many complaints here. Based on the comments I think there is some misunderstanding about the nuts and bolts of this program. These are loans. They are two year low interest loans. They have to be paid back unless some or all is forgiven. Forgiveness requires documentation on employees retained, wage history, and is capped at $20k/employee maximum. And of course a piece of that comes back to the government in terms of payroll taxes. Just because a company took a 1M loan, doesn't mean it will be 100% forgiven. For those complaining the companies don't "need" the money - I know many households who received $4k+ in stimulus checks that didn't need it. Should they not have taken it? And anyways, the whole point of this program was to get money to businesses quickly. Means testing takes time. Sure there are going to be some questionable loans. Some fraud too. But overall our government has spent a lot more money and gotten worse returns than the PPP.

ta17711771 6y ago
> unless some or all is forgiven. RIPE for favoritism, aka, corruption.
- eric_b 6y ago
  I don't think favoritism is a concern. The forgiveness guidance is not, to my knowledge, finalized. But what we've seen so far is pretty cut and dried. It's possible some people could convince their lender to forgive more than they should - but certainly those meeting the forgiveness criteria will get it. Corruption and fraud are certainly possible - though the lenders got paid from the government just for originating the loans. That is, they already made their money. There's no extra money in them over-forgiving a loan.
  - IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
    Favoritism on the part of banks was real. Source - applicant for 4 separate, PPP loans that were eventually awarded. Banks are not stupid. They awarded funds first to their clients that had outstanding loans with them. That meant the banks' own portfolio was not impaired, thanks to influx of PPP

hardtke 6y ago

My kids' private school recently sent out a $500 per student tuition credit (about $650K for the entire school). I see now that they got a multi million dollar PPP loan (which will be forgiven). Their revenues were unaffected by the epidemic (full enrollment for next year and no plans to rollback the tuition increase).

eric_b 6y ago
Unless you can see their books you really have no idea how their revenues did. And you really have no idea what additional expenses they're incurring due to COVID mitigations.
ryanwaggoner 6y ago
My kid's private school also got a PPP loan, but I don't begrudge them that at all. They applied for the program according to the rules and they're using that money to pay for necessities. While our school also hasn't (yet) lost much in the way of enrollment, their finances are worse now: - more costs for financial aid - more costs for cleaning and retrofitting facilities - more costs for experts on reopening safely - more costs for online education programs (software, training, etc) - refunds of after-school programs, field trips, etc. - fewer donations from alumni The only thing that's really improved is maybe utilities? They 100% would have laid off teachers if they didn't get the PPP. It's ludicrous that people are begrudging schools for using this program exactly as intended.

mikemac 6y ago

One thing to note is there seems to be a lot of errors in the data. For instance, Bird is in the 5-10M range but claimed it never actually applied. https://www.axios.com/paycheck-protection-program-disclosure-problems-1b1b8f81-b3de-4ec8-bacc-5312ac6d53f3.html https://www.axios.com/paycheck-protection-program-disclosure...

xrd 6y ago

Does anyone know the requirements around getting these loans? For example, if employees were furloughed without pay (but kept healthcare) are they still within bounds of the loan if they indicate they retained the jobs listed?

ksdale 6y ago
You don't get forgiveness for wages you don't pay.
- fullstop 6y ago
  Is there any penalty for increasing wages after receiving the "loan" ?
  - ksdale 6y ago
    Increasing whose wages?
    - fullstop 6y ago
      Those who are having their Paycheck Protected.
  - digitaltrees 6y ago
    It was unclear originally but the SBA issued guidance that this was acceptable. Think about it, isn’t hazard pay for employees coming back to work at risk of Covid exposure ok? Shouldn’t we applaud companies willing to pass PPP to employees? Let’s not be so quick to label everything fraud, or greed. Sure some people will misuse funds. But most wont. Most people are good.
- xrd 6y ago
  What happens if that happens? What recourse, if any, does an employee have in that case? Is anyone looking out for those cases?
  - 6y ago

heurist 6y ago

Definitely missing some, one of my companies is not listed (sub-$100k loan).

fullstop 6y ago
It only includes loans over $150k. edit: I swear I can type
- georgespencer 6y ago
  > It only includes loans up to $150k Do you mean "over" $150k? Parent's loan was <$150k.
  - fullstop 6y ago
    I did, my mistake.
mikemac 6y ago
The Treasury only provided business name data over 150k. You can get the de-identified data by state for loans under 150k: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance-for-small-businesses/sba-paycheck-protection-program-loan-level-data https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/cares-act/assistance...

fullstop 6y ago

Here's a Youth Baseball group which received 5-10 Million: https://pppreport.org/company/lafayette+youth+baseball+association https://pppreport.org/company/lafayette+youth+baseball+assoc... edit: https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=814110 https://www.naics.com/code-search/?naicstrms=814110 "Private Households"

aazaa 6y ago

It's a little surprising how many are banks. A few random searches showed about 80% of the companies are banks. On reflection, though, not so surprising.

HaloZero 6y ago
Huh, I didn't really see that. I did some cursory searches and haven't found a lot of banks. Maybe you're thinking the lender field is the category of the company?

nullc 6y ago

There are a remarkable number of sketchy blockchain companies in this list-- many for larger $5 to $10 million dollar ranges. I wonder how many of them were sitting on millions or tens or even hundreds of millions of deceptively obtained ICO funds at the time they obtained these 'loans'. E.g. I see at least one that raised over 100k BTC in ICO funding just couple years ago.

vmception 6y ago
Although ICO purchasers like to imagine they have investments in "not-securities", proper accounting of token sales from the issuer is revenue, and payroll goes to employees. So if they had that revenue and also paid payroll to employees in 2019, they would be eligible. The 2018 ones were screwed though, too far back. They probably exhausted a lot of their runway on marketing and extortionate exchanges. Blockchain community is unique in that they treat $5-10 million raises as "forever money" for an indefinite time period, when even Series A tech companies would not be expected to last more than 15-18 months. So there are a lot of misalignments in that sector, which are poorly understood by both the people in the sector, as well as critics outside of the sector. The issuers themselves often have good legal help and proper accounting, as it is a tricky regulatory environment to begin with, which exacerbates these misalignments with their purchasers and psychological investors.
- nullc 6y ago
  > often have good legal help That hasn't been my experience, instead my experience is that many of these companies went through large numbers of lawyers who told them what they wanted to do would be likely found to be illegal before finding some that would sign off on it. > "forever money" for an indefinite time period For the most part this is because they don't deliver anything useful, so they won't get any more (at least not until they spin up a new operation under another name). Some of the companies I see in that database have principals who are on their third or more failed blockchain/ico and hey have become exceedingly efficient at it.
  - vmception 6y ago

phreeza 6y ago

https://pppreport.org/company/ayn+rand+institute+center+for+advancement+of+objectivism https://pppreport.org/company/ayn+rand+institute+center+for+...

abtinf 6y ago
https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-it-again/ https://newideal.aynrand.org/we-took-ppp-funds-and-would-do-...

hprotagonist 6y ago

Without this program, my employer would have had to either lay off a large group of employees or we would've gone under. As it is, out of a group of about 50, we furloughed 8, who continued without pay, qualified for unemployment benefits, but retained 100% health coverage. Two have returned to work already and we anticipate being more or less normal again in time to meet the loan forgiveness criteria. It's good to have the database open to see -- and, hey, to double-check that we actually got it.

_curious_ 6y ago
So will your employer be paying the "loan" back?
- dopamean 6y ago
  Most of the loan isn't designed to be paid back. So what are you getting at?
  - luckylion 6y ago
    If it's not designed to be paid back, is it a loan? noun: loan; plural noun: loans a thing that is borrowed, especially a sum of money that is expected to be paid back with interest. Is it just called a loan because that sounds better than just calling it a subsidy?
    - dopamean 6y ago
      So the issue is with what the government is calling it?
      - luckylion 6y ago
        I believe that's why the parent comment had used quotes. It's not a loan, it's a subsidy. Calling it a loan is misleading, because loans are meant to be paid back, and this isn't.

digitaltrees 6y ago

I think PPP saved the economy. We can scapegoat and find problems. But don’t ignore what would have happened in its absence. Companies would reduce spending at the very least or go out of business at the worst. We would have entered a self reinforcing cycle of reduced spending and purchasing creating a depression.

uptown 6y ago
"I think PPP saved the economy." You ain't seen nothing yet.
- digitaltrees 6y ago
  Only if people criticize these initial attempts and prevent more assistance. Yes. This is going to get worse, but government support could continue.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    That's pretty much what people describe when they say "privatize the profits, socialize the losses", isn't it? And you're already preparing to shift the blame towards the people critical of that approach.
    - digitaltrees 6y ago
      Privatizing profit and socializing losses is better applied to more ordinary situations where ordinary business risk is shifted to the public. Here we are taking about the total possible social loss caused by a pandemic, not ordinary business risk. The point is that in society will be more harmed by inaction than supporting businesses.
ryanwaggoner 6y ago
I agree. I'm horrified by the current administration and their handling of the health side of this pandemic, and I'm completely shocked at how well the Federal government and the Federal Reserve have managed the economic side. Between the stimulus checks, the PPP, and the trillions spent by the Federal Reserve to prop up various markets. Yes, many mistakes were made and we'll end up having spent hundreds of billions on fraud and waste, but I don't think people have an inkling of how bad things would have gotten otherwise. All I can say is that I'm glad most of the people commenting here aren't in charge or this country would have completely collapsed. And it still could! I think things will get very dark very fast if Congress doesn't extend at least some of the $600 / week unemployment benefits.

j-c-hewitt 6y ago

Anyone who saw these offers and did not expect the strings attached in terms of government meddling and/or decentralized witch-hunting for taking the money offered was foolish. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

sajit 6y ago

Admire the transperancy.

thedogeye 6y ago

Not a good look for the Ayn Rand Institute lol

digitaltrees 6y ago
Haha. Good find.
hckr_news 6y ago
Yeezy as well
nullc 6y ago
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ayn-rand-social-security/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ayn-rand-social-security/

_curious_ 6y ago

How interesting it is...not even through the A's yet in my major city and I am seeing peer companies on here reporting more "jobs retained" than they even employ...if that doesn't indicate what a scam this whole thing is, what would it take to make that clear? Edit to add: further down the list I am seeing tech co's that actually laid off large % of employees that received millions still. They probably were not counting on this information becoming public (though it obviously is/should be by default)...any respect I may have had for them is no more. Disgusting behavior.

chanmad29 6y ago

I hate billionaires not spending this pocket change but depending on government for such loans. But to play devil's advocate, aren't these most/all companies set up as limited liability, and therefore these billionaire owners are absolved of any responsibility to take on such bailouts? So is this moral problem or more a structural problem on how the enterprise is being set up?

ryanwaggoner 6y ago
"Billionaires" (or the much, much more common millionaires and hundred-thousand-aires who own most companies) wouldn't "spend the pocket change", they'd just lay people off or furlough them. This program was designed to keep businesses afloat and to keep them from laying off employees. It's a nice idea to think that all these companies would just altruistically keep their employees around doing nothing while they're shut down, but that wouldn't happen.

llacb47 6y ago

I like this better: https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/business/sba-ppp-data/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/business/sba-pp...

unstatusthequo 6y ago

This is great intel for those who will phish the recipients. There’s a point where transparency causes risk...

gm 6y ago

Just so you all know, Twitter's going crazy with the apparent rampant inaccuracy of the database.

WrongThinkerNo5 6y ago
Is the complain about the DB of the website or the raw data is inaccurate? The former I can shrug off as insignificant, the latter is mildly terrifying and makes you wonder how the hell we can trust anything the government does when they can't even take care of keeping track of triple billons of dollars of other people's ... namely, people who did not get any stimulus ... money. But I guess the bureaucrats and kleptocratic government must have been ramping it up after the billions upon billions they "lost" in Iraq without a trace. This is probably going to turn into politicians and bureaucrats throwing up their hands when companies claim that the information is inaccurate and they owe nothing and the government cannot prove anything, a la, housing fraud.

simonw 6y ago

I have a Datasette running of this here: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/foia_150k_plus https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/fo... You can run your own SQL queries against it. Here's a query I wrote that shows the most common NAICS codes (industry categorization from the census): https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus?sql=with+counts+as+%28select+NAICSCode%2C+count%28*%29+as+num_loan_recipients+from+foia_150k_plus+group+by+NAICSCode+order+by+num_loan_recipients+desc%29%0D%0Aselect+counts.NAICSCode%2C+counts.num_loan_recipients%2C+naics_2017.name%2C+%27https%3A%2F%2Fsba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com%2Floans_150k_plus%2Ffoia_150k_plus%3F_facet%3DCity%26_facet%3DState%26_facet%3DRaceEthnicity%26_facet%3DBusinessType%26_facet%3DGender%26_facet%3DVeteran%26NAICSCode%3D%27+%7C%7C+NAICSCode+as+view_them+from+counts+join+naics_2017+on+counts.NAICSCode+%3D+naics_2017.id https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus?sq... You can click through from there to get faceted search of e.g. every loan made to a dentist: https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/foia_150k_plus?_facet=City&_facet=State&_facet=RaceEthnicity&_facet=BusinessType&_facet=Gender&_facet=Veteran&NAICSCode=621210 https://sba-loans-covid-19.datasettes.com/loans_150k_plus/fo... I have full notes about how I built this here: https://github.com/simonw/sba-loans-covid-19-datasette https://github.com/simonw/sba-loans-covid-19-datasette

lgats 6y ago

For some more digging, here is a list of S.E.C. registered companies loosely matched to the dataset using the company name: https://pppreport.org/sec.php https://pppreport.org/sec.php -list contains any company with a ticker [current/previous OTC stock or other] -likely to contain many false associations, but still full of surprises $NTN, $6.3m Market Cap $TRNF, $22m Market Cap $FAT, $40m Market Cap each received 1-2 million in PPP

bl4ckneon 6y ago

Something I find amusing is the amount of miss spellings for some bigger cities. San Francisco is spelled around 10 different ways. You think people would spell check the city they live in before asking for hundreds of thousands of dollars or more...

I_am_tiberius 6y ago

I'm wondering why Saas companies like "CODA PROJECT INC" are on that list. I would have assumed they are not effected by the corona crisis. I thought they would benefit from it.

albntomat0 6y ago
If their customers have significantly reduced income due to the pandemic, SaaS companies will get hit as well, even if they work from home, and their immediate customers (other businesses) do so as well.

hownottowrite 6y ago

The purpose of the Paycheck Protection Program is to keep people off of unemployment. The type of company taking the loan really doesn’t matter. Revenues don’t matter. What matters is that they have the employees (salary) to justify the funds. Forgiveness will be granted when they demonstrate they’ve kept their staffing levels the same. The whole thing is designed to prevent even more job losses. That’s it.

rakjosh 6y ago

I was working on a similar website :) https://ppp-loan.info/ https://ppp-loan.info/

raviolo 6y ago

So, what if a business was successful, not impacted by covid, and wasn’t planning to lay off any employees anyway? Say, technology consulting company with 100 employees. Took out a PPP “loan”, which will be promptly forgiven since they keep the staff, who gets to keep the money? Something tells me 100% goes to business owner and 0% to employees. I think there are quite a few companies like this. Hence “money goes to those who least need it”.

zzleeper 6y ago
You are exactly right. In fact, I know of a few businesses that actually had MORE business (wholesalers), and the CEO of one told my friend that he was just going to use the money to buy his wife a new Porsche. This is anecdotal for sure, but there is no reason why firms wouldn't rely on free money as long as they are amoral enough. If I had implemented the plan, I would have just created a program where the program only covered a % of the wages (say 80% instead of 100%) and mostly only for people who were not able to work. Of course, that brings other problems, but there is a middle ground somewhere in there.
- raviolo 6y ago
  And I know a business owner who is shopping for a new house after getting a PPP “loan”. Sure, PPP money is supposed to be used for payroll. No problem, one can indeed use PPP money for payroll 100%. But then use the business revenue, 90% of which would normally be used for payroll, to take out a nice bonus and buy a house.

dsalzman 6y ago

I made a graphical map of this PPP data. Here https://www.dannysalzman.com/2020/07/07/map-of-ppp-funding https://www.dannysalzman.com/2020/07/07/map-of-ppp-funding Full screen - https://www.dannysalzman.com/files/ppp_map_v1 https://www.dannysalzman.com/files/ppp_map_v1 Warning - large file download (128mb) doesn't work well on mobile

downvoteme1 6y ago

I have a question that somebody more knowledgeable can answer. My company, a recruitment agency, took 2 to 5 million in these loans and kept me hired . But since my main client kept me hired , the recruitment agency kept paying me. So did this recruitment agency just make 2-5 million in free money - just by proving that they ran my payroll- which they did. because the client kept me hired anyway.