STBL: Survey of Terms of Business Lending (restricted access)

Confidential supervisory data: not exercised here

STBL loan-level data is confidential and was collected by the Federal Reserve. Published aggregates (the E.2 release) are public, but the loan-level records carry no provenance badge: there is no access path we can run here. Researchers reach the loan-level data only through a Federal Reserve affiliation or an approved restricted-data arrangement, inside a secure environment, with output subject to disclosure review. The page documents what the collection is and the gotchas; treat it as unverified. This is the honest grade under the institute’s Verified discipline.

STBL (the Survey of Terms of Business Lending) was a quarterly Federal Reserve survey in which a sample of banks reported the terms of a sample of new commercial-and-industrial (C&I) loans made during a survey week: amount, rate, maturity, collateral, commitment status, and the bank’s internal risk rating (a 1 to 5 scale). It is a standard source for loan pricing and loan-risk research. The survey ran from roughly 1977 to 2017 (when the Fed discontinued the E.2 release); the internal risk-rating component was added in 1997, so the risk-rating studies start there. A paper we distill uses it: Falato & Scharfstein use the STBL loan risk rating as a measure of the riskiness of new lending when studying how going public affects bank risk-taking (their sample runs through 2012, the end of their broader panel, not the end of the survey).

• Cost: not for sale at the loan level. The E.2 aggregates were published free.
• Collector: Federal Reserve Board (the STBL collection; E.2 release).
• Coverage: a sample of banks reporting a sample of new C&I loans, quarterly. The survey ran from roughly 1977 to 2017; the internal risk rating is available from 1997 on. It is a sample of loans, not a census.

Access (restricted)

• The E.2 aggregates are public; the loan-level data is not. The Fed published the aggregate Survey of Terms of Business Lending (E.2) release; the loan-level micro-records are confidential.
• Through a Federal Reserve affiliation or approved program. Loan-level access is limited to researchers at the Federal Reserve System or others granted entry to the restricted data, worked inside a secure environment with output subject to disclosure review.
• The survey was discontinued in 2017, so it covers a closed historical window; there is no ongoing collection.

Gotchas (the ones that bite pipelines)

These are the failure modes to expect; they are documented, not verified here.

• It is a sample of loans in a survey week, not all lending. A reporting bank submits a sample of loans made during the survey week, so the data is a stratified sample, not the bank’s full loan book. Use the survey weights; do not treat counts as totals.
• Internal risk ratings are bank-specific. The 1 to 5 risk rating is mapped from each bank’s own internal grades, so the scale is not strictly comparable across banks. Treat cross-bank rating comparisons with care.
• The survey ended in 2017 and the risk rating starts in 1997. Risk-rating analysis is bounded below by 1997 (when the rating was added) and above by 2017 (when the E.2 release was discontinued); there is no continuation past then. Do not extrapolate the series outside that window, and do not confuse a paper’s own sample end with the survey’s end.
• New loans only, C&I only. The survey captures terms of newly made C&I loans, not outstanding balances or other loan types. Match your question to the new-loan, C&I scope.
• Definitions and the sampling frame changed. Reporting panels and definitions were revised across the survey’s life; a field can change basis between vintages. Read the instructions for your period.
• Output is disclosure-reviewed and cannot be redistributed. Loan-level results leave the secure environment only after review.

Citation

Cite the collection and collector, e.g.: Survey of Terms of Business Lending (STBL), Federal Reserve Board, confidential loan-level data; accessed under restricted-data arrangement, YYYY-MM-DD. For the public series, cite the E.2 release. State the sample window (the risk rating is available from 1997; the survey ended in 2017) and the use of survey weights.