Sal Christ, Reporter for Albuquerque Business First:

Consumers in, businesses out.

A new survey from the Federal Reserve System has found that during the fourth quarter of 2015, a number of banks moderately eased lending standards for some consumer loans while tightening standards for a number of business loans.

According to the Fed's January 2016 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices, banks largely tightened lending standards for commercial and industrial and commercial real estate loans during 4Q 2015, citing a "less favorable or uncertain" economic outlook this year. Some of the banks surveyed specifically cited energy industry challenges as a factor.

In general, more than 10 percent of those surveyed said they tightened standards for "large and middle-market" firms with annual sales of $50 million or more, and about seven percent tightened standards for businesses with less than $50 million in annual sales.

While this could translate into tighter credit standards for business owners seeking loans in 2016, many of the same banks are easing standards on some consumer loans. More specifically, some banks have eased standards for unqualified and/or subprime mortgage and auto loans to consumers.

Some five to seven percent of banks said they eased credit standards for non-QM (qualified mortgage) jumbo residential loans and non-QM non-jumbo residential loans. Furthermore, one big bank said that it had also eased standards for subprime residential mortgages. While the vast majority of those surveyed stated that their bank did not originate subprime residential loans, more than 80 percent of those surveyed originate non-QM residential mortgages.

Additionally, despite the fact that most respondents expect delinquency and charge-off rates on subprime auto loans to rise this year, more than 12 percent of large banks said their credit standards for auto loans eased during last quarter. Click here to read the full article.