Senior Loan Officer Survey - Second Quarter of 2017

Results of the Second-Quarter 2017 Survey | Vol. 10.2 | 30 June 2017

This Senior Loan Officer Survey (SLOS) focused on changes to business-lending practices in the second quarter of 2017.

• Survey results suggest that overall business-lending conditions were essentially unchanged for the fourth consecutive quarter (Chart 1).1
• Price conditions tightened somewhat, after three quarters without change (Chart 2).2 This tightening was mainly driven by price conditions for corporate borrowers.
• Non-price conditions were nearly unchanged for the third straight quarter. Some notable easing for commercial borrowers in British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic provinces was offset by tightening targeted at small business and commercial borrowers in the Prairies.
• The overall demand for credit in the second quarter experienced the largest increase since the fourth quarter of 2014, driven by corporate borrowers and small businesses in British Columbia and the Prairies.
• Access to capital markets was mostly unchanged for all grades of borrowers in the second quarter.

The Senior Loan Officer Survey collects information on the business-lending practices of major Canadian financial institutions. In particular, the survey gathers the perspectives of respondents on price and non-price terms of business lending and on topical issues of interest to the Bank of Canada. The survey is conducted quarterly, near the end of the quarter for which the results are reported. This survey was conducted between May 8, and June 9, 2017. Additional information on the survey is available on the Bank of Canada’s website.

The survey results summarize opinions expressed by the respondents and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Bank of Canada.