If small business is the beating heart of the American’s $30 trillion economy then it might be surprising to find out that the lifeblood it counts in the form of funding via loans, comes not from Wall Street’s mega-#banks like JPMorgan, Wells Fargo and Bank of America, but from a tiny branchless bank in #Wilmington North Carolina, just seven miles from Michael Jordan's boyhood home. Founded in 2008, Live Oak Bancshares, has 1,053 employees, $14 billion in assets, and a $1.5 billion market capitalization. Since 2017, it has issued $15.4 billion in government-backed 7(a) loans, more than any other bank in the country including the aforementioned #WallStreet heavyweights. The 7(a) program is the Small Business Administration’s flagship offering, designed to help small businesses that might not qualify for conventional credit. Live Oak’s average loan is just $1 million, chump change for bigger, brand name competitors, but the lender does around $2 billion a year in #SBA #loans, plus ano...