# banks_search_institutions Resolve a bank name or identifier to ranked FDIC institutions. | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Category | Banks (`banks`) | | Exposure | public | | MCP tool | `banks_search_institutions` | | Documentation | https://www.agentdatasets.com/docs/tools/banks_search_institutions | ## Description Resolve a bank name or identifier to ranked FDIC institutions. The shared envelope returns the echoed search in `data.query`, ranked `data.matches`, FDIC provenance and freshest match timestamp in `meta`, and null `pagination` because this is a bounded relevance result. Each match includes cert and RSSD identifiers, name/location, active status, regulator/charter metadata, lifecycle dates, score, match reason, and `as_of`. Pass a match's `cert` to `banks_get_financials`. Use this for FDIC-insured bank institutions. The `stocks_*` tools cover SEC public-company filers instead: an FDIC cert is not a stock ticker. The default limit is 10 and maximum is 50. Errors are `bad_parameter` for an empty query and `unknown_entity` for no identifier/name match; near-miss names can include suggestions. Example: `banks_search_institutions(query="Frost Bank", limit=5)`. ## Parameters Input schema advertised to MCP clients and mirrored by the REST query string. | Parameter | In | Type | Required | Default | Constraints | Description | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | query | input | `string` | yes | — | — | Institution name, FDIC certificate number, or Federal Reserve RSSD id. Digits perform an exact identifier lookup; names are case-insensitive and rank exact, prefix, then substring matches. Use this first to resolve a bank name to the cert required by banks_get_financials. | | limit | input | `integer` | no | 10 | min 1, max 50 | Maximum ranked institution matches (1–50). | ## Provenance - `fdic` — Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Institutions directory (cert-keyed entities) and curated quarterly bank financials, FDIC BankFind Suite API (U.S. Government work, public domain (17 U.S.C. § 105)). See https://www.agentdatasets.com/docs/attribution.md Dataset registry: `banks_institutions`.