The circumstances were certainly unusual and exigent, and for the most part, the authority was used to target critical markets that performed the same function as bank lending but were outside the banking system. Initially, 13(3) was used to establish lending facilities for securities dealers around the time of the near failure of Bear Stearns.
And when runs on money market mutual funds caused the funds to stop buying commercial paper, it was used to support the commercial paper market, a key source of funding for businesses.