[throwaway_USD]

>Call me skeptic but it's likely that banks prioritized applications of companies that have significant debt with the bank.

They certainly did, on April 3 the day the program started of the 4 big banks only Bank of America began accepting applications with restrictions to applicants (example: must be an account holder and have pre-existing loans with the bank).

BOA was already sued by business owners in attempt to get court order to force BOA to open up the application process to everyone, and the Judge already ruled the banks have freedom to prioritize their own customers on any basis they like because the CARES Act did not prohibit the banks in anyway from doing so.

Now there have been multiple lawsuits against multiple banks, here is a link to one of the Judge's orders denying the restraining order against BOA: https://www.pierceatwood.com/sites/default/files/Order%20den...

In short the banks with get an automatic 5% of the total $350B, plus of those loans that don't get forgiven, the banks can sell them on the secondary market. So as you point out the Banks basically got $17.5B to lend money to businesses that already owe them money.