SBA Honors 2014 Export Lenders of the Year
April 23, 2014
(SBA)
Citibank and GBC International Recognized at
Export Lenders Roundtable, in Washington, D.C.
WASHINGTON – Today, Citibank, N.A. and GBC
International Bank were honored as the top 2014
Export Lenders of the Year by the U.S. Small
Business Administration, for large and small
lending institutions, respectively. The awards
were presented by Luz Hopewell, Deputy
Associate Administrator and Dennis Chrisbaum,
Director International Trade Financing, Office
of International Trade, during a ceremony at
the 7th annual SBA Exports Lender Roundtable,
in Washington, D.C.
Donna Marie Donaldson, Vice President and
Export Finance Manager at Citibank, and Annie
Pen, Executive Vice President at GBC
International Bank received the awards on
behalf of their institutions.
“To succeed in the global marketplace,
America’s small businesses require capital to
access overseas markets, fund their export
transactions, and expand their local operations
to meet overseas demand. All this will create
jobs here at home. SBA and its lending partners
are ready and willing to meet those capital
needs with specially-designed export loans, and
I want to congratulate these winners for
actively supporting their exporting customers,”
said SBA Administrator Maria Contreras-Sweet.
U.S. exports are proving increasingly important
to the nation’s economy, and SBA export lenders
play a pivotal role in helping small business
exporters to compete and succeed in the global
market. Between FY 2012 and FY 2013, the dollar
volume of SBA’s “core” export loans increased
by 64.8 percent, while all SBA loans to
exporters experienced an increase of more than
28 percent and enabled a 71 percent increase in
the dollar value of exports supported by
financing.
In 2011, Citibank began including the SBA
Export Working Capital program in its strategic
plan, offering asset-based lines of credit
between $1 million and $5 million. Citi has
shown remarkable growth in SBA export
financing, moving from three Export Working
Capital loans for $6.1 million in 2012 to 17
such loans for $73 million in 2013. That growth
earned the bank the SBA 2014 Export Lender of
the Year award for large institutions.
GBC International Bank is a privately held bank
with long-standing expertise in handling
international trade. The bank is headquartered
in Los Angeles and has offices in both southern
and northern California, as well as in
Washington state. GBC uses all three of SBA’s
“core” export loans, which resulted in a
significant increase in their support for
exporting customers in FY 2013, going from 11
loans for $9.7 million in 2012 to 20 loans for
$17 million in 2013, and, as a result, they
stood out as a clear winner for SBA’s 2014
Export Lender of the Year award for small
institutions.
The Export Lenders Roundtable is an annual
event sponsored by the SBA Office of
International Trade, where export lenders and
other experts come together to share good
practices and get acquainted with new
regulations and procedures to encourage
increased export financing to small
businesses.
For more information about SBA’s export lending
programs, visit www.sba.gov/international
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