KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, May 8 (Bernama-PRNewswire) — The current COVID-19 situation has adversely affected the economic health of many businesses, especially small and medium enterprises (“SMEs”). This has led to cash flow being the biggest challenge as SMEs readjusts their operations during the MCO period to ensure that they could continue to meet their financial obligations, including retaining staff on their payroll. To ensure that SMEs receive the necessary financial relief in a timely manner, Hong Leong Bank (“HLB” or the “Bank”) enhanced and simplified the application and approval process for SME loans so that they can fast track the Bank Negara Malaysia (“BNM”) Special Relief Facility (“SRF”).
As of April 30th, 2020, HLB had approved approximately RM1.3billion of facilities under the BNM SRF for over 1,600 SMEs spanning across sectors ranging from wholesale and retail trade, manufacturing, construction to transport, storage and communication.