In response to the COVID-19 global pandemic, the U.S. Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Stimulus (CARES) Act, which established the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) to provide economic relief to small businesses. The first phase of the PPP established funding of $349B and was fully utilized within 14 days. With subsequent legislation, Congress approved an additional $601B in PPP funding and extended the program through May 31, 2021. At of the end of May 2021, over 11.8 million PPP loans were approved by over 5,300 lenders for a total value of close to $800B.

Due to the exceptional volume of lending and extension of the program to May 2021, OCRM is still in need of additional support to monitor risk of the PPP portfolio at the loan and lender level. The department is responsible for lender oversight and risk management of the PPP program, including lender compliance assessments, conducting due diligence to ensure taxpayer dollars are protected, and monitoring overall portfolio risk. Oversight is imperative as a lack of compliance may result in additional cost to the taxpayer, harm to the borrowers, and reputational risk for the Agency. These tasks are ongoing since implementation of the PPP.