How the numbers are built
How CapBench ranks SBA lenders
CapBench ranks SBA 7(a) lenders from public SBA loan-approval records. National rankings reflect how much 7(a) volume a lender approved over the fiscal year; state rankings reflect how active a lender has been in that state over the most recent trailing twelve months.
Data sources
- •SBA 7(a) loan-approval records (public, by approval date and lender)
- •FDIC institution data (for bank size and identity matching)
- •CapBench lender enrichment (typical loan size, industries, funding speed)
National rankings
A lender's national rank is driven by total 7(a) production in the fiscal year — the count and dollar volume of 7(a) loans the lender approved. Lenders that approve more 7(a) money rank higher.
Production is read from SBA's published approval records, attributed to the approving lender of record. Loans sold or serviced by a different institution are still credited to the lender that approved them.
State rankings
A lender's per-state rank reflects approval activity in that state over the trailing twelve months, so a regionally active lender is not buried under national banks that do little business locally.
We use a trailing window rather than the full fiscal year so a state page reflects who is lending there now, not who led three years ago.
What each profile adds
Beyond rank, each lender profile shows the typical loan size, the industries and states the lender is most active in, the franchise brands it has financed, and an estimated funding speed — all derived from that lender's own approval history.
What this does not tell you
- •Rankings describe past approval activity, not a lender's current appetite, credit box, or likelihood to approve any specific borrower.
- •Volume leadership is not a quality signal — a high-volume lender is not necessarily the best fit, and a smaller lender may be a stronger match for a given deal.
- •Records are refreshed on SBA's publication cadence; the data-freshness date on each API response shows the cutoff.
AI summary
This page explains the methodology behind how capbench ranks sba lenders on CapBench: where the underlying data comes from, exactly how the numbers are calculated, and what the result can and cannot tell you. Every figure is derived from public SBA 7(a) and FDIC records.
It exists so any stat CapBench publishes can be traced back to its source and computation rather than taken on faith. This is general information, not legal, tax, or financial advice, and CapBench is not a lender.
Source: CapBench SBA Intelligence, based on public SBA, lender, franchise, FDIC, and related records. CapBench is not a lender and does not guarantee financing.
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