his speech on Wednesday afternoon as traders applauded the size of his deficit reduction package. Traders said the president picked an ambitious goal that, if pursued, would require the government to sell fewer bonds in the future and keep the nation in good standing with creditors. "It's a positive for bonds because it helps to preserve the triple-A credit rating of the United States," said Tom Simons, money market economist at Jefferies & Co in New York. Obama proposed cutting ballooning U.S. budget deficits by $4 trillion over 12 years and curbing deficits to 2.5 percent of gross domestic product in 2015 and 2 percent toward the end of the decade from the current 9.8 percent projected for 2011. His plan would include ending Bush-era tax rates for the wealthiest Americome good equipment – we knew we could crank up that place," said Foil, who also used the loan to buy equipment and another factory in South Carolina. "We have the advantage of being stronger at a time when others aren't." Now that demand is up and business is finally improving for many companies, they're doing what they always do at the beginning of an expansion – calling the bank and asking for a loan. And in a stark contrast to the depths of the financial crisis, the banks are saying yes. In the last three months of 2010, U.S. Bancorp wrote $8 billion in new business loans, the most in two years. JPMorgan Chase added 400 midsize companies as clients. And bank loans overall grew for the first time in two years, according to the Federal Reserve. "Companies are talking about growth in ways they haven't for three years," says Perry Pelos, head of Wells Fargo's commercial banking. Loans are one of the best gauges of economic growth. Small and midsize s have been generating most of their profits in recent quarters from dipping into money they previously set aside to cover bad loans. Those reserve reductions make sense if credit losses are stabilizing, which seems to be the case. But banks cannot reduce their loan loss reserves forever and at this point profit growth must come from making more money from loans and generating more fees, analysts said. Boosting interest income from loans is tough when the interest rates at which banks lend are so low and loan demand is still tepid. Fee income, meanwhile, is being threatened by future regulatory changes. "The revenue line wi