4 More Foreign Publicly Traded Companies Secure PPP Loans While Mom and Pops Left Out at Sea

WASHINGTON, D.C. – This week’s Securities and Exchange Commission filings show 21 additional publicly traded companies secured over $25.9 million in SBA Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funds meant for struggling small businesses on main street, including at least four foreign-based companies that were deeply in the red before the health crisis. To date, 688 publicly-traded firms or conflicted companies – some worth more than $100 million – have secured $1.8 billion in forgivable PPP loans.

While the PPP program is designed to help mom and pops impacted by the health crisis, the latest PPP winners included Ireland-based Trinity Biotech which secured a $4.5 million forgivable PPP loan after paying its executives $1.1 million and reporting net losses of over $22 million last year. Israel-based RedHill Biopharma secured $2.3 million in PPP funding after compensating its executives $2.7 million and reporting over $42 million in losses. Canada-based BriaCell Therapeutics Corp. took home a $127,00 PPP loan after reporting over $5.7 million negative net income in 2019 while paying its executives $433,000. And Israel-based ReWalk Robotics was granted over $390,000 in taxpayer assistance after reporting over $15.5 million in losses last year while its executives still enjoyed a $1.1 million compensation package.

“The Trump administration keeps the tax dollars flowing to large publicly traded companies no matter what ‘financial issues’ they had going into the crisis or whether they even call the U.S. home,” said Derek Martin, spokesman for Accountable.US. “If only they paid a fraction of the attention to the thousands of small businesses that never got the help they were promised and had no choice but to lay off over 11 million workers last month.”

These filings were compiled as part of an ongoing tracking project by government watchdog Accountable.US. TrumpBailouts.org documents the billion-dollar corporations and other large companies that have received taxpayer assistance under the CARES Act, and what advantages and assets they had going into the COVID-19 crisis that most small businesses could never access.

THIS WEEK’S PUBLICLY TRADED PPP BENEFICIARIES: 

Previously controversial PPP grantees include a foreign-owned uranium mining corporation with ties to the Trump administration, at least two companies that market their ability to ship U.S. manufacturing jobs overseas, major luxury hotel chains, a fashion model agency, and even the L.A. Lakers.

SMALL BUSINESS LEFT BEHIND: The Trump SBA’s Paycheck Protection Program has been bungled since day one, offering red tape and rejection to struggling small business owners while rolling out the red carpet for large publicly-traded companies that have resources average shops do not. A shocking recent report estimates over 100,000 small businesses have permanently closed since the pandemic took off in March while another showed small businesses let go 11 million workers in April alone. And a recent survey found only 12 percent of Black and Latino small business owners got the PPP loans they asked for, and nearly half say they expect to close for good in the next six months. Meanwhile, well over 600 publicly-traded firms or conflicted companies – some worth more than $100 million – have walked away with over a billion and a half dollars in taxpayer money. It’s no wonder the Trump administration has shied away from transparency in this process.

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