The CFPB Tuesday issued an interim final rule to extend compliance deadlines for its small business lending rule. Implementation of the rule had been stayed by a federal court in Texas pending the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in CFPB v. CFSA, which required the CFPB to extend the rule’s compliance deadlines to compensate for the period stayed.
As part of ongoing litigation, America’s Credit Unions, Cornerstone League, Rally Credit Union, and others filed a motion to set aside the rule, which requires financial institutions to collect and report certain data on applications for credit for women-owned and minority-owned small businesses under section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Act.
The interim final rule extends compliance dates by 290 days, the time elapsed between the Texas court’s first issuance of a stay last year and the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in CFPB v. CFSA last month. In addition:
- Lenders with the highest volume of small business loans must begin collecting data by July 18, 2025;
- Moderate volume lenders by Jan. 16, 2026; and
- Smallest volume lenders by Oct. 18, 2026.
The deadline for reporting small business lending data to the CFPB is still June 1 of the calendar year following the beginning of data collection. Thus, high volume lenders will first submit data by June 1, 2026, while moderate and low volume lenders will first submit data by June 1, 2027.
Under the interim final rule, lenders may continue using their small business originations from 2022 and 2023 to determine their initial compliance date, or instead use their originations from 2023 and 2024.
The CFPB has also updated its grace period to reflect the revised dates, where it does not intend to assess penalties for reporting errors for the first 12 months of collection and intends to conduct examinations only to assist lenders in diagnosing compliance weaknesses, as long as lenders engage in good faith compliance efforts.
The CFPB’s small business lending data submission platform will be available for open beta testing in August. Despite the CFPB’s victory in the Supreme Court ruling on its funding, the final rule still faces challenges on non-constitutional grounds. The Texas district court is expected to rule on those challenges later this year.
