Accompany Capital Receives Upgraded Rating from Aeris

We are very pleased to announce that we have received a three-star impact management rating and an A+ financial strength and performance rating from Aeris, the rating and information service that provides comprehensive, third-party assessments of the financial strength and performance and impact management of CDFIs.

The rigorous Aeris rating process is a demonstration of a fund’s commitment to transparency and accountability, with regard to its financial performance and impact in the community. The rating encompasses two main components:

• An Impact Management Rating, which measures the commitment of the fund’s management to achieving its stated impact
• A Financial Strength and Performance Rating, which assesses overall creditworthiness

Not all CDFIs Opt to Get an Aeris Rating

We chose to apply 9 years ago because we wanted to find a tool that would help us review our own progress. With Aeris’ annual rating process, we are able to do a full scan to get an objective review of our systems. This allows us to see if we are meeting best practices and have the right ones in place that will enable us to get to the next level. We have found that going through the annual rating process now helps keep us on message, on mission, and focused on goals.

With that in mind, we are very pleased that our financial strength and performance rating was upgraded this past year to A+ from A, which we maintained through the pandemic lock downs and recovery, our most challenging period. We are also pleased to have maintained our three-star impact management rating.

Investors Rely on Aeris Ratings

We are particularly grateful because a wide range of investors—including banks, foundations, fund managers, and others—rely on Aeris ratings to identify and evaluate community investment opportunities that meet their impact goals and risk parameters. Aeris has issued more than 1,200 ratings opinions since 2004.

Since participating we have already attracted new investors, such as Grow with Google Small Business Program, the Sachs Family Foundation, and the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  

Additional Aeris Benefits

As an Aeris-rated institution, Accompany Capital is also included in the Aeris Cloud, the only source of real-time financial and impact performance data on community investment funds. The Aeris Cloud was created to give investors access to Wall Street-quality data on community investment funds such as Accompany Capital. It also gives us access to the Aeris Explorer, the first web-based CDFI analytics tool, with charts and graphs that summarize historical trends for key performance metrics, which will help us understand our performance relative to peers, as well as the Aeris Performance Map, whose dashboard will monitor our current and historical performance through the same ratios, tables, and graphs presented in the Aeris Rating Report.

Using data from the Aeris Explorer and Performance Map to inform our practices, we will continue to refine our programs to better serve our clients.