Image: Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building. Source: iStockphoto, traveler1116

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Federal Reserve’s program to back emergency government loans to small businesses is “fully operational,” the U.S. central bank said on Thursday.

The program is designed to make it easier for banks to offer loans under the $350 billion Paycheck Protection Program by extending credit to financial institutions that make the loans, using the loans as collateral. “Supplying financial institutions with additional liquidity will help increase their capacity to make PPP loans,” the Fed said.

Reporting by Lindsay Dunsmuir; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama.

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Source: Reuters