PNC 2023 Corporate Responsibility Report: Pursuing Economic Empowerment
We believe that being a meaningful part of the community means more than collecting a profit. That’s why working to strengthen and serve our communities is at the heart of our everyday business.
DRIVING COMMUNITY BENEFITS
Our commitment to improving outcomes for communities continues to guide our economic empowerment efforts. We firmly believe that this work must be responsive to the needs of the communities we serve and implemented in collaboration with strategic partners to help build a more equitable future for all.
Launched on January 1, 2022, and scheduled for completion in 2025, the PNC Community Benefits Plan (CBP) is our pledge to help drive that success through $88 billion in loans, investments and other financial support to bolster economic opportunity for low- and moderate-income (LMI) individuals, communities and people of color.
The plan builds on our long-standing commitment to economic empowerment by supporting key areas:
- $47 billion in residential mortgage financing and home lending
- $26.5 billion in small business loans
- $14.5 billion in community development lending and investments
- $500 million in charitable giving
In 2023, PNC deployed $21 billion of the $88 billion committed, and since the CBP was launched, we have deployed $56 billion, nearly 64 percent of the total amount committed to help meet community needs and boost economic empowerment. Specifically, during the past year, PNC’s CBP impact includes:
- Affordable homeownership: Building on our efforts to expand homeownership opportunities and support the development of generational wealth, our aggregate impact in residential mortgage and home equity loans nationwide totaled $13.2 billion, including more than 12,000 borrowers in minority census tracts.
- Small business support: PNC is committed to reducing barriers to banking and increasing access to credit for small businesses. We deepened our investment by providing $4.7 billion in loans and investments. This supported small businesses and small farms operating in low-to middle-income communities, majority-minority census tracts, and businesses with revenues of less than $1 million. Small businesses and farms with revenues of less than $1 million received more than 26 percent ($1.2 billion) of the total loans.
- Community Financing: To accelerate investments in impactful community and economic development initiatives, PNC provided $3.2 billion in community development loans and investments. This helped to create jobs, increase and preserve the supply of affordable housing, boost neighborhood revitalization efforts, and improve access to healthcare and other critical services in underserved communities across PNC’s footprint.
- Charitable support: PNC’s commitment to building stronger communities goes beyond loans and investments. In 2023, the company awarded $128.6 million* in charitable giving to support individuals and communities across its footprint.
- Financial education: PNC piloted the Center for Financial Education, a robust curriculum of workshops that provide information, strategies and resources to help LMI families build economic stability and generational wealth in six PNC markets.
- Mobile branches: PNC is using mobile branches as community outreach tools to extend essential banking services into LMI communities and strengthen relationships with unbanked or underbanked members of these communities.
In 2020, PNC committed $1 billion to challenge systemic racism and support the economic empowerment of Black and LMI individuals and communities across PNC’s markets.
Four years later, PNC has fulfilled this pledge — providing more than $1 billion in community financing and an additional $50 million in charitable giving to support social and economic mobility initiatives benefiting LMI individuals, communities and people of color.
PNC Community Benefits Plan (CBP), YEAR 2
Since the CBP was launched and as of December 31, 2023 $56B OF $88B committed in the CBP
HOMEOWNERSHIP
$38.3B OF $47B in residential mortgage financing and home lending
SMALL BUSINESS
$9.8B OF $26.5B in small business loans
COMMUNITY FINANCING
$7.9B OF $14.5B in community development lending and investments
CHARITABLE SUPPORT
$249.8M* OF $500M in charitable giving
$352.3M spent in 2023 with diverse suppliers, including minority, women, veteran and LGBTQ+–owned business.
*Charitable giving number includes mortgage assistance grants and PNC Foundation expenses, and it does not match with the philanthropic giving number in other sections of this report.
WORKING TO MEET THE NEEDS OF OUR COMMUNITIES
Our communities, the places we call home, and our employees are the driving force behind everything we do. Through our work in Community Development Banking (CDB), we contribute to improving quality of life in low- and moderateincome (LMI) neighborhoods by supporting affordable housing, community development lending, economic development, financial education and customized financial solutions.
As part of our $88 billion Community Benefits Plan, PNC convened a Community Advisory Council (CAC) to discuss areas of community need across our footprint and to create a platform that allows for dialogue with community partners. This council convened three times in 2023 to collaborate with PNC to help address LMI community needs and assist in the implementation of PNC’s Community Benefits Plan.
Held in October 2023, our second annual Community Leadership Symposium included actionable insights and evidence to advance economic opportunity for LMI and majorityminority communities. In partnership with Urban Institute, we shared research findings from PNC’s inaugural Shareholders Needs Assessment, an in-depth survey of community development financial institutions (CDFIs) challenges in LMI communities. The survey results highlighted the prioritization of affordable housing and small business support. More than 160 community and public policy leaders and economic development experts participated in symposium discussions covering affordable housing, financial well-being, economic development, CDFIs, community needs and more.
PROMOTING FINANCIAL ACCESS
At PNC, we’re dedicated to helping our customers progress confidently in their financial journeys, regardless of their current stage. Our comprehensive range of convenient products is tailored to suit every phase of life and every financial aspiration. We firmly believe that even a small step taken today can significantly impact our customers’ financial futures for the better.
Ensuring financial access also means helping customers manage their money. PNC’s Low Cash Mode® on Virtual Wallet® continues to help our customers do just that with alerts, payments control and extra time to avoid overdraft fees. Since 2021, we have reduced those fees by over 60 percent. Our customers have saved more than $672 million in overdraft fees by using the features of Low Cash Mode and through our pricing changes. Once reaching a negative balance, nearly two-thirds of Low Cash Mode customers have been able to use Extra Time to return their account to positive and avoid paying a fee. Customer complaints about overdrafts have been cut in half. In 2023, we continued to provide overdraft fee relief, reducing the maximum number of overdraft fees to one fee per day for all consumer accounts.
In 2023, our Foundation Checking Account helped empower those who are unbanked and underbanked. This product meets the Bank On National Account Standards for low costs and fees, no overdraft fees, and customer-friendly features.
Mobile Branches Where Our Communities Need Them
Since 2020, our mobile branches have helped the unbanked and underbanked communities across the country gain access to crucial banking services and provide resources to help those communities become more financially educated and empowered. In 2023, PNC reached a significant milestone by launching this program in a tenth market within the United States. This latest achievement not only extended PNC’s innovative banking services to more communities, but also fulfilled a key commitment within PNC’s $88 billion Community Benefits Plan.
In 2023, our mobile branches completed more than 1,500 deployments traveling over 57,000 miles. This reach has positively impacted nearly 9,000 individuals through collaboration with more than 80 community organizations.
Our mobile branches can be found in Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, Dallas-Fort Worth, Detroit, Greater Philadelphia, Houston, Phoenix and South Florida.
PNC’s mobile branch teams lead discussions centered on financial education and wellness. Then, when the client is ready, the team provides personalized consultations on personal and small business banking, including account openings and instant debit card issuance. Community members can also gain insights into understanding credit reports and credit history, explore affordable homeownership options, and much more. PNC tailors these solutions and its financial curriculum to the unique needs of each community it serves, helping to ensure that the bank remains a committed ally in financial empowerment.
These services are complemented by free financial education seminars aimed at helping participants make more informed financial decisions.
In 2023, our mobile branches completed more than 1,500 deployments traveling over 57,000 miles. This reach has positively impacted nearly 9,000 individuals through collaboration with more than 80 community organizations.
EXPANDING OUR COMMITMENT TO FINANCIAL EDUCATION
Financial literacy and wellness begin with education. From bilingual financial education workshops to educational resources for students, we’re committed to delivering the most relevant insights and learning opportunities to help our clients better understand their finances and make sound financial decisions that promote financial wellness.
In 2023, PNC served 27,447 LMI individuals via 1,584 financial education classes. Building on strategy work from the prior year, PNC launched the Center for Financial Education to better serve unbanked, underbanked and other LMI individuals facing barriers to building financial assets. A pilot was launched over a six-month period to test facilitating in-person financial education workshops, primarily in partnership with local community organizations serving LMI individuals and small business entrepreneurs. The curriculum included financial literacy workshops on personal finance, homeownership and small business banking. The pilot demonstrated successful engagement with participating community partners, workshop participants and PNC employees.
PNC’s My Finance Academy and our Student Banking Center provide information, insights and ideas that help to build healthy financial habits for high school, college and beyond. My Finance Academy offers educational videos, podcasts, articles and other tools to help our clients build their financial knowledge and confidence, such as the College Savings Calculator and Student Budgeting Calculator.
In 2023, PNC:
- Hosted approximately 1,000 participants for a live webcast featuring Chelsea Fagan, founder & CEO of The Financial Diet, for “6 Money Lessons I Wish I’d Learned Earlier.”
- Implemented a financial wellness webinar calendar in which student-centric topics of banking basics, credit, budgeting and ID theft were presented. From September through December, two webinars per month were presented.
- Coordinated 75 in-person financial wellness seminars on college campuses across the country.
Organizational Financial Wellness
For more than 25 years, PNC Organizational Financial Wellness (OFW) has served organizations and their employees through customized financial wellness programs that combine innovative service and solutions. These solutions help employees gain financial confidence and security while helping organizations improve productivity, performance and retention. Today, more than 40,000 organizations and nearly 1.6 million households utilize these programs.
PNC OFW launched Student Debt Solution to provide employees with a holistic approach that helps them reduce the impact of student loans on their current financial well-being. The solution provides options ranging from identifying loan forgiveness and refinancing to helping borrowers better manage their repayment schedule. It also provides organizations with new options to directly help their employees tackle student debt, either through employer contributions or employer matching contributions. It also helps organizations automate and digitize the certification process for Public Service Loan Forgiveness, where applicable.
Additional 2023 highlights include:
Releasing our inaugural Financial Wellness in the Workplace Report 2023: What Employees Want (and Need). The study offered insights for organizations to consider as they balanced the urgent needs of their employees with the financial realities of their own organizations.
Delivered 28,000 financial wellness events across 4,100 organizations.
Facilitated 1,200 financial education seminars with more than 10,000 employees, designed to engage and educate them across a variety of relevant topics.
Hosted nearly 7,000 individual financial wellness consultations to better understand and address employees’ unique financial goals and needs.
Helped nearly 193,000 employees manage healthcare expenses and plan for the future through Health Savings Accounts and other benefit spending accounts.
Expanding Financial Access for Small Business*
Consistent with PNC’s efforts to reduce barriers to banking and increase access to credit, we have deepened our commitment to small business. We collaborated enterprise-wide to deliver financial solutions that help position low- and moderate-income (LMI), minority-owned and micro businesses for effective growth, development and sustainability. We continue to support loans to small businesses, including small farms operating in LMI communities, with $9.8 billion in loans.
In 2023, PNC spent $352.3 million (or 8.9 percent of eligible spend) with diverse suppliers, including minority, women, veteran and LGBTQ+–owned businesses.
*For more information about supporting Small Business, see Supplier Diversity and Supporting Minority Business sections of this report.
Supporting MDIs and CDFIs
In 2022, PNC launched a task force to develop a comprehensive strategy to support minority deposit institutions (MDIs). Today, PNC supports more than 40 MDIs and provides a broad range of services, including investments, access to our ATM network, low-cost deposits and loan sales, and capital market and banking products. PNC lent or invested $96 million to 27 CDFIs and five MDIs during 2023. Product breakdown is as follows:
- $47 million in 12 Equity Equivalents (EQ2s)
- $27 million in Term Loans
- $16 million in Lines of Credit
- $2 million in Funds
- $4 million in Certificates of Deposit (CDs)
Expanding Access to Affordable Housing
We know that homeownership is one of the biggest decisions, and we are here to support individuals and families through that important process. That means doing our best to enhance homeownership opportunities for all, including LMI and minority borrowers. Our flexible products, programs and wide variety of down payment options help customers buy and stay in their homes.
In 2023, in excess of one-third of PNC’s mortgage units supported LMI borrowers and communities within our primary markets. Our affordable lending sales staff and management team consists of 28 Affordable Lending Specialists who are trained specifically to assist LMI borrowers and communities.
Last year, our Mortgage Affordable Lending department conducted 28 educational “Affordable Lending Solutions” outreach events, in collaboration with Freddie Mac and National-Link services. These events were intended to help LMI borrowers navigate the path to homeownership. The events included education regarding the benefits of homeownership, understanding the home buying process, available grants and subsidies, product options, forecasting for real estate professionals, and local market analysis and opportunities.
PNC also conducts ongoing affordable lending training for our sales teams, operations and branch network employees. This training emphasizes the usage of our affordable lending product suite and our processes for utilizing and offering subsidies to consumers.
Providing Safe Homes for Survivors of Domestic Violence; Expanding Access to Early Childhood Education
PNC has provided $27 million in federal and state Low-Income Housing Tax Credit equity for a critically needed $47 million development providing 63 new affordable homes in Montebello, California, a predominantly Hispanic community that borders East Los Angeles. With a median household income of just $47,488, 15.4 percent of the community lives below the federal poverty line, making the need for more affordable housing dire.
Half of the homes in this development will be reserved for survivors of domestic violence, who will also benefit from supportive services to help ensure their well-being and success. The homes will be developed by the César Chávez Foundation, an organization focused on coupling housing with social services.
PNC has also provided a $100,000 grant to the César Chávez Foundation through the PNC Foundation to create Starting with Hearts, a Transitional Kindergarten curriculum and educator training program for public elementary schools in some of Los Angeles County’s most under-resourced communities. The curriculum and ongoing training will expand equity-focused early childhood education for the most vulnerable learners — students from low-income backgrounds and multilingual learners — as they enter the rest of their K-12 educational trajectory.*
*The example provided is for illustrative purposes only and reflects specific circumstances that pertain to this project. Other projects may seek to address needs that are relevant to the community or region in which properties are located and will be subject to different considerations.
Our 2023 affordable lending achievements include:
- Recognition as “Best for Low Down Payment” mortgages in the U.S. News Best Loan Companies Ratings.
- Recognition as the “Allied Member of the Year,” National Association of Real Estate Professionals – Great Lakes Region.
- Recognized by Forbes as one of the “Best Discount Program Options.”
- An increase in the PNC Grant for LMI borrowers from $3,000 to $5,000 to assist with down payments, closing costs and possible interest rate reductions.
- Roll-out of PNC’s Special Purpose Credit Program that provides up to $10,000 of assistance for borrowers in majority-minority census tracts within specific markets.
- $10.3 million in PNC mortgage assistance grants benefiting 2,664 recipients.
- Aggregate Residential Mortgage and Home Equity loans nationwide totaling $13.2 billion, including more than 12,000 borrowers in minority census tracts.
- 150+ renewed/approved down payment assistance programs.
At PNC, we recognize the far-reaching impacts of the affordable housing shortage, and we’re making a difference by investing in the production of affordable housing across the country. In 2023, we invested $1.1 billion in the development of 6,813 affordable homes, spanning from urban centers — including $42 million to create 127 affordable homes for low-income families in a new 635-unit Chicago high-rise — to rural communities — such as $12.1 million to renovate a 125-year-old school to provide 37 homes for low-income seniors in Dillon, South Carolina.
In addition to PNC’s investment in affordable housing, PNC also supports the development and advancement of community facilities and initiatives to revitalize communities suffering from historic disinvestment. In 2023, PNC Multifamily Capital (formerly known as PNC Tax Credit Solutions) invested $150.7 million to support 30 projects that provided critically needed healthcare services, education and workforce development, community services, and jobs in severely distressed communities across the country.
The expertise of our Multifamily Capital team and PNC’s strong financial position have made PNC a national leader of strategic and impactful community investment. To do this work, PNC utilizes many of the nation’s largest and most effective community development tools, including the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC), New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC), Historic Tax Credit (HTC) and our own Affordable Housing Preservation Investments. In total, PNC Multifamily Capital manages $14.09 billion in equity that supports more than 132,700 affordable rental units, 198 NMTC investments and 67 historic properties nationwide.
Community Impact in 2023
$150.7M PNC and PNC syndicated funds invested in supporting 30 New Markets Tax Credits (NMTC) projects across 14 states.
$1.1B PNC and PNC syndicated funds invested in 62 properties to create or preserve 6,813 affordable units across 22 states.
$65.9M PNC invested in rehabilitating 10 historic properties across nine states.
