The New York Federal Reserve set lending rates for its consumer loan program for March on Thursday.

The $200 billion Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility, or TALF, is issuing loans to investors so they can buy highly rated newly created securities backed by auto, credit card, student and small business loans.

Borrowers can choose either a fixed or floating rate on each TALF loan. The central bank said "in general" the interest rate on floating rate loans will be 100 basis points over one-month Libor and on fixed rate loans will be 100 basis points over three-year Libor swap rate.

The rates on TALF loans backed by government-guaranteed collateral will be 50 basis points.

Fixed rates on loans offered in March for auto-loan-backed deals were set at 2.733% and for floating rates at 1.523%.

Fixed rates for credit-card-loan backed deals were set at 2.733% and for floating rates at 1.523%.

For private student-loan-backed deals, the floating rate was set at 1.523%.

For government-guaranteed student-loan-backed deals it will be 1.023%.

The floating rate on small business 7(a) loan-backed deals is 1% and the fixed rate for the 504 loan-backed deals is 2.233%.

The administrative fee is 5 basis points.

The maturity date for the loans is March 26, 2012.

The U.S. central bank began accepting requests for TALF on Tuesday.

The facility is aimed at jump-starting the securitization market, which dried up during the financial crisis in the past few months.

Interest in the program is strong, according to some market participants, as investors line up to find out if they are eligible and how best to access the non-recourse funds at rates and terms market participants call "attractive."

Thursday marked the deadline for investors interested in participating in round one of the program that will dole out funds once a month. The Fed hands over funds from this round March 25.

The bank has issued several clarifications about who would be eligible for the funds, saying if a borrower posts "eligible collateral there should be every expectation of financing."

-By Anusha Shrivastava, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-2371; anusha.shrivastava@dowjones.com