Large banks and financial institutions will have nine more months to comply with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's small business lending rule, which states:
The CFPB announced Tuesday that lenders with the largest volume of small business loans must begin collecting data by July 18, 2025, while lenders with moderate loan volume must begin collecting data by Jan. 16, 2026. Lenders with the smallest volume have until Oct. 18, 2026. The bureau said:
The CFPB said it does not intend to impose penalties for reporting errors for 12 months after a recovery, and that as long as lenders are making good faith efforts to comply, the CFPB intends to conduct examinations to help lenders diagnose compliance weaknesses.
The Small Business Lending Rule, also known as Section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Act,
Banks and lenders have long opposed the collection of data on small business loan applicants because that data could be used by federal and state regulators to determine whether lenders discriminate against women and minority borrowers. CFPB Director Rohit Chopra called the rule a “census of small business lending” that would “ensure that banks and nonbanks are serving small businesses fairly.” The data collection would be similar to mortgage data collected under the Home Loan Disclosure Act.
The bankers
The CFPB said large lenders will initially submit data by June 1, 2026, and mid-size and small lenders will submit data by June 1, 2027. Under the interim final rule, lenders can continue to use their 2022 and 2023 small business lending history to determine their initial compliance date, or they can use their 2023 and 2024 lending history instead.
The rule allows lenders to collect demographic data up to a year prior to the compliance date in order to test their procedures and systems. The CFPB also announced that its Small Business Lending Data Submission Platform will be available for open beta testing in August.