Former Los Angeles Lakers guard and team president Earvin “Magic” Johnson announced his life insurance company will provide $100 million for women- and minority-owned small businesses as part of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).
According to Forbes, Johnson was motivated after hearing reports of minority- and women-owned businesses being shut out of the PPP.
“We knew why the money was gone and couldn’t trickle down to small businesses, especially small minority businesses, because they didn’t have those great relationships with the banks,” Johnson told the Wall Street Journal.
MBE Capital is designed to help small and diverse businesses take advantage of this latest round of PPP funding.
After feeling ignored in the first round of PPP loans, African American-owned banks and businesses have found ways to team up to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
