The H.8 release provides an estimated weekly aggregate balance sheet for all commercial banks in the United States; it also reports data separately for domestically chartered banks, for the large bank and small bank subcategories of those institutions, and for foreign related banking institutions. Balance sheet detail is limited mainly to bank loans and investments; the release provides estimates of only the major deposit and nondeposit liability categories.

The large banks covered by the H.8 release are generally the largest domestically chartered banks and hold approximately one-half of the assets at all domestic and foreign banks in the United States. The number of banks in the H.8 large-bank universe now stands at approximately 30. However, these institutions do not correspond exactly to the largest domestically chartered banks. To provide better geographic representation, the large bank universe contains a few relatively small banks (assets of about $20 billion). Also, some large banks whose assets are concentrated in credit card loans have been placed on the small-bank H.8 panel because the less-detailed balance sheet information that small banks report is considered adequate to capture the basic lending activities of such banks.

The large-bank balance sheet data reported on the H.8 are simply the aggregate of the approximately 30 banks selected for that universe. The small bank data are based on a sample of about 1000 institutions and represent an estimate of the aggregate balance sheet of all domestically chartered banks not included in the large bank universe. Foreign-related institutions include U.S. branches and agencies of foreign banks as well as Edge Act and agreement corporations. The data for U.S. branches and agencies are an estimate of all such institutions based on a sample of about 60 institutions. The data for Edge Act and agreement corporations cover all such institutions, but they are available at only a quarterly frequency; the weekly data are estimated by interpolation. These institutions account for approximately one percent of the assets at all foreign-related institutions.

The report forms and instructions on which the reported weekly data are based may be found at www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/reportforms/default.cfm. The report forms are FR 2416 (for large banks), FR 2644 (for small banks), and FR 2069 (for U.S. branches and agencies). The release, published weekly, is typically available to the public by 4:15 p.m. every Friday. If Friday is a Federal Holiday, then the data are released on the following Monday.

Statistical releases