Reflections from a Hispanic Heritage Month conversation with City National Bank’s Latino Community Network
“If you want to go far, we go together.” Paul Quintero, CEO of Ascendus, shared that idea with close to 50 colleagues of City National Bank’s Latino Community Network during From Ambition to Ascension: The Latino Entrepreneurial Journey, a Hispanic Heritage Month conversation held on October 1, 2026.
It is also the clearest way we know to describe what Latino entrepreneurs need from the institutions around them. The ambition is already there. What carries it from a first sale to a business that lasts is support that moves with the entrepreneur: capital at the right moment, guidance along the way and partners who stay for the long run.
Ambition is already here
Latino entrepreneurs are building at remarkable scale. According to the 2026 U.S. Latino GDP Report from California Lutheran University’s Center for Economic Research and Forecasting and UCLA’s Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture, the number of Latino-owned businesses grew 158% between 2007 and 2023, compared with 23.7% for non-Latino-owned businesses. Over the same period, the Latino share of U.S. businesses nearly doubled, from 8.7% to 16.5%.
That growth reaches well beyond the founders. Small businesses generate two out of every three new jobs in the United States, Latino-owned employer businesses grew nearly 20 times faster than their non-Latino peers, and Latinos accounted for 56.5% of U.S. labor force growth since 2010. Behind every one of those numbers is a founder with a plan, a team and a community counting on them.
A little capital can go a long way
“You don’t need a lot of capital to change a life,” Paul said. For many small business owners, the right amount of capital at the right moment makes the next step possible: hiring a first employee, taking on a larger contract or opening a new location.
What carries that capital further is everything that comes with it: guidance on how to put it to work, a clear read on cash flow, credit that grows with the business and people who understand the entrepreneur’s goals, language and community. Each of those steps strengthens a household and a neighborhood along with the business, and every one of them is a shared effort.
“Being in the game doesn’t mean you win the game.”
Paul Quintero, CEO, Ascendus
Going far, together
As businesses grow, their needs change. An entrepreneur who starts with a first loan and financial coaching may later be ready for a larger line of credit, treasury services or a commercial banking relationship. When community lenders and banks work together, each brings what it does best, and entrepreneurs keep moving forward with institutions that already know their story. That continuum is the spirit of our collaboration with City National Bank.
Support also reaches well beyond any loan desk. Paul shared advice for every colleague in the room, including those whose work never touches a small business loan: shop local, tell people about CDFIs and organizations like Ascendus, donate, volunteer and talk about wealth building and money at your dinner table.
Taken together, these everyday actions build the community that helps a business last, and conversations about money that start at home shape how the next generation saves, borrows and builds.
The next chapter
Hispanic Heritage Month celebrates the histories, cultures and contributions of Hispanic and Latino communities, and Latino entrepreneurs write the next chapter of that story every day. When financial institutions, their colleagues and community lenders move with them, that ambition grows into businesses that last, jobs that stay in the neighborhood and wealth that passes to the next generation. That is what Financial Ascension for All looks like in practice.
We thank Ana María Gómez, Ruth Burgos and City National Bank’s Latino Community Network for the invitation and for a conversation that reminded us how far we can go together.
