(Submitted by AgCredit)
AgCredit – one of northern Ohio’s largest lenders for farmers, rural homeowners and agribusiness – recently declared a patronage refund of 30.03 percent for 2017 resulting in $24.1 million refunded to its member borrowers.This patronage payment provides a refund to the lending cooperative’s shareholders of 30 cents for every dollar they accrued in interest on their loans for the past year. The patronage refund is the equivalent of 1.53 percent net savings on interest.
Over the past five years, AgCredit has averaged a 30.36% patronage refund rate and has paid patronage refunds for 31 consecutive years. During this time, it has distributed more than $270 million to its borrowers.
Earnings for 2017 were $57 million. AgCredit’s year-end numbers reflected a 4.63 percent growth rate and $83 million increase as loan volume increased from $1.796 billion to $1.879 billion.
AgCredit CEO and president, Brian Ricker shared and reviewed information about the co-ops financial status with approximately 500 members and guests who attended its annual meeting held April 10 at Meadowbrook Park in Bascom.
“Returning value to our members by sharing our profits is a key objective for our cooperative. Returning over 30 cents on every dollar of interest on a loan provides a significant boost to our members especially during a time when many are experiencing lower incomes and higher expenses,” said Ricker.
Even with historically high asset quality levels the cooperative lending association continues to mitigate credit risk as a preferred lender working with the United States Department of Agriculture’s Farm Service Agency’s guarantee program. Nearly 29 percent of AgCredit’s loan volume is secured through this program which allows it to capitalize growth by using it as an effective capital leveraging tool to enhance credit quality and credit risk.
AgCredit is a member of the Farm Credit System which was established by Congress more than 100 years ago. For additional information, please visit www.AgCredit.net.
