The Treasury Department’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund today awarded $26 million to 158 FDIC-insured banks through the fiscal year 2021 round of the Bank Enterprise Award Program.
Through the BEA Program, the CDFI Fund awards FDIC-insured depository institutions that increase their investments in CDFIs or in their own lending, investing or service activities in the most distressed communities—where at least 30% of residents have incomes that are less than the national poverty level and where the unemployment rate is at least 1.5 times the national rate.
CDFI Fund Director Jodie Harris noted that this year, there has been a 243% increase in qualified loans to businesses made by 135 banks that provided nearly $1.7 billion in loans to 12,642 businesses located in highly distressed communities.
Collectively, during the one-year assessment period for the FY 2021 BEA Program round, the 158 award recipients increased loans and investments in distressed communities by $895.1 million; loans and deposits to CDFIs by $36.1 million; equity-like loans and grants to CDFIs by $1.29 million; and the provision of financial services in distressed communities by $183.4 million.
