Mid-sized companies--those with annual sales between $10 million and $250 million--produce a significant percentage of the nation's output; thus, any conditions impeding their performance should concern public policymakers. One such condition may be insufficient access to short-term credit at competitive prices. In order to evaluate the competitiveness of lending markets, analysts must be able to identify their geographic boundaries.

This article, the second in a series on middle-market lending, investigates the boundaries and concentration levels of middle-lending markets in New England. It relies primarily on the results of a survey of mid-sized businesses conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in 1992, supplemented by interviews with CEOs and senior commercial lending officers at several of the region's largest banks. The author concludes that the boundaries of New England's middle-lending markets have changed during the past 10 years, as large depositories capable of satisfying the credit needs of mid-sized firms have become more numerous and expanded geographically.