This Is the Best Time Since the Recession to Get a Small Business Loan

Feeling the entrepreneurial itch? This is the best time in years to start a small business with a loan from a big bank, according to a new report from online loan marketplace Biz2Credit.

Banks with $10 billion or more in assets have raised their approval rates for small business loan requests to the highest level since 2011, when Biz2Credit started tracking them. In June 2011 big banks granted a measly 8.9 percent of small loan applications. Last month they approved 22.19 percent.

“These are the best numbers for big bank lending since the recession," Biz2Credit CEO Rohit Arora said in the report.

Related: What the U.S. Must Do to Avoid Another Financial Crisis

Banks had pulled back sharply on small business lending during and after the financial crisis. As a result, startups began turning to alternative lenders and credit unions. Those other sources of funding now have approval rates of 61 percent and 43 percent respectively, but those rates have been steadily declining, making the rebound in bank loans all the more welcome.

Bank approval rates are still well below where they were before the recession — and the Biz2Credit report is based on an analysis of just 1,000 loan applications on the site — but the trend is an encouraging one for the entrepreneurs among us.

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