3 Things You Should Know About Small Business: April 17

NEW YORK (MainStreet) - What's happening in small business today?

1. IFA's 2nd Small Business Lending Summit. The International Franchise Association, along with the Financial Services Roundtable, the Consumer Bankers Association and the National Association of Government Guaranteed Lenders have joined forces to host a day-long Small Business Lending Summit today. Six different panels will be held discussing ways to improve lending to small businesses. Industry experts and policy leaders will weigh in with remarks on access to credit and capital, veterans initiatives as well as views from the Obama administration.

Unfortunately there is no Webcast link, but follow the Twitter hashtag #sbls2012 to stay updated throughout the day on what's happening at the summit.

The IFA in partnership with BoeFly, an online matching service that connects small businesses with lenders, launched the IFA/BoeFly Franchise Lending Index at the summit. The monthly index is the first to assess the health of franchise lending.

The index is created from a monthly analysis of data from BoeFly's marketplace and franchise loan data from the Small Business Administration.

Franchise lending experienced a growth of 10.56% between February 2011 and February 2012. While there was a net gain during the 12-month period, there were many months seeing expansion and retraction.

"In developing the current index, we explored how borrowers were using credit to establish new franchise units or to refinance existing debt," says Mike Rozman, the co-president of BoeFly. "In the first two months of 2012, there was a meaningful shift in the direction away from new development."

Approximately 43% of approved loans in February were used to fund new businesses, down from 54.9% in January, he adds.