Methodology
Sources and methods: SBA 7(a) and 504 records through June 30, 2026, FDIC call reports.
US Lender Metrics is built from two public government sources. We do not buy data, survey lenders or accept payment for rankings.
Sources
- SBA 7(a) and 504 loan records. The U.S. Small Business Administration publishes every approved 7(a) and 504 loan under the Freedom of Information Act, with the lender, the borrower's city and state, industry code, amount, terms and loan status. We use loans approved from fiscal 2010 onward. The current file runs through June 30, 2026.
- GeoNames postal codes. City pages and zip code search use the GeoNames postal code database (CC BY 4.0) to turn each borrower's zip code into its postal city and map location.
- FDIC call reports. Every insured bank files a quarterly financial report. Bank financials on lender pages come from the quarter ending June 30, 2026, and bank headquarters locations come from the FDIC's institution directory.
How rankings work
- State rankings count loans by the state where the borrower's business is located, so a national lender based elsewhere still counts in every state it lends in.
- Rankings use loans approved from October 2021 (the start of fiscal 2022) to June 30, 2026. Lenders are ranked by number of loans, with dollar volume as a tiebreaker. Counting loans rather than dollars keeps one very large loan from dominating a small state.
- 7(a) and 504 lenders are ranked separately. For 504 loans, the lender of record is the certified development company. The figure shown is the SBA-backed portion, not the full project cost.
- "Startups" means loans where the SBA recorded the business as not yet open, new, or under two years old.
- Charge-off rates use loans approved from 2010 to 2019 that have since been paid off or charged off, so recent loans that have not had time to go bad don't make a lender look safer than it is. We show the rate only when at least 50 loans have closed out.
- City pages group loans by the postal city of the borrower's zip code, so suburbs get their own pages instead of being folded into the nearest big city. A city gets a page after 25 loans in the window. Searching a zip code takes you to that zip's city page, or to the nearest city page in the same state when the town is too small for its own page.
- A lender gets its own profile page after making at least 10 SBA loans in the window. Cities need at least 10 loans to appear.
Lender identity
The SBA records each bank's FDIC certificate number and each credit union's NCUA number, so we link loans to lenders by those numbers rather than by name. Non-bank lenders and development companies are grouped by name and location. When banks merge, past loans stay with the lender that made them.
Privacy
The SBA's files include borrower business names and addresses. We never publish them. Every figure on this site is a total across many loans, and cities with fewer than 10 loans are left out.
Limitations
- The data covers approved loans only. It does not show applications, declines or the lender's non-SBA lending.
- The SBA updates its files quarterly, a few weeks after each quarter ends, so the newest loans lag.
- Bank financials describe the bank, not the SBA program, and are context, not a safety rating.
Spot an error? Email team@uslendermetrics.com and we'll check it against the source.