The Treasury Department’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund today announced $40.1 million in awards to 171 FDIC-insured banks through the Bank Enterprise Award Program’s fiscal year 2024 round of funding.
The awards provide financial incentives to FDIC-insured depository institutions that “exhibit a quantifiable increase in investments directed toward CDFIs or that increase their own lending, investing or service operations in severely distressed areas,” according to the CDFI Fund. Distressed communities are characterized by conditions where at least 30% of the population lives below the national poverty level and the unemployment rate is no less than 1.5 times the national average. The banks receiving awards are “providing essential loans and investments that other financial institutions are unwilling to offer,” CDFI Fund officials said.
Of the 171 institutions awarded funding, 96 committed to investing approximately $9.6 million in persistent poverty counties, representing 24% of the total appropriated funds for this round and exceeding the congressional requirement of 10%. Persistent poverty counties have sustained poverty rates of at least 20% over the past 30 years, based on U.S. Census Bureau data.
