To demonstrate its primary mission, an entity must provide one of the following types of governing leadership-approved documents that clearly state its mission or purpose: 

The Controlling Entity Option for collective review accountability allows an Affiliate entity that does not offer Financial Products to demonstrate collective review Accountability through a controlling entity. This Controlling Entity must be accountable to the selected market, even if it does not share that entity’s board or the Controlling Entity is not itself subject to review.

Each entity in a CDFI Certification collective review must show accountability to its selected collective review market through its own governing or advisory board. For each relevant Affiliate, a CDFI Certification Market record must be added in its AMIS Organization Detail page, using the Record Purpose: “CDFI Certification – collective review for another entity”.

The selected collective review market can be:

The stock summary report for the CDFI Certification Application must detail the ownership of voting stock shares in your organization, identifying all individuals and entities that own 25% or more of the voting stock. It should include the names of all owners, their respective ownership percentages, and clearly document any ownership exceeding 25%. If your report shows “0%” for Insured Depository Institutions or Depository Institution Holding Companies, it indicates no ownership in these categories.

No. CDFI Certification Applications cannot be reopened for modification by the Applicant after submission in AMIS.

However, Applicants can modify their CDFI Certification Application up until they submit the Application to the CDFI Fund for review. 

No. During the General Recertification Submission Deadline Windows, currently certified CDFIs have been assigned a designated submission window for their Section Zero Application. Once this submission window closes, a currently Certified CDFI cannot submit a Section Zero Application until after a determination has been made on its submitted CDFI Certification Application. Entities whose CDFI Certification is reaffirmed will be able to submit a Section Zero Application prior to the Annual Certification and Data Collection Report (ACR) submission. 

Yes. If your organization submits a request for a Section Zero determination that proposes a new Targeted Population, it must also propose a corresponding Target Market assessment methodology. Any request for a new Targeted Population that does not include a request for a corresponding Target Market Assessment Methodology will be deemed incomplete.

Before submitting a request for a Section Zero determination, an organization should review all questions in this FAQs document, the Pre-Approved Target Market Assessment Methodologies and Frequently Asked Questions, the 

No. As of February 20, 2025, organizations applying for CDFI Certification are not required to submit a Section Zero Application in AMIS. Organizations may launch and submit their CDFI Certification Application without submitting a request for a Section Zero determination.