AgTrust Farm Credit is a customer-owned lending cooperative. That means our borrowers are also owners who have the opportunity to share in our earnings through an all cash patronage dividend. We believe in giving back to the valued customer-owners who make our success possible.

Part of our mission and tradition is the paying of a patronage dividend. Every year, AgTrust Farm Credit’s board of directors reviews the Association’s financial health and determines our ability to pay a cash dividend to eligible stockholders through our patronage program – typically in the spring. Other remaining earnings are retained as capital to keep our Association strong for the future.

AgTrust Farm Credit follows the fundamental cooperative principle of sharing its earnings with its customer-owners in the form of patronage when it does well. Thus, a patronage refund is a distribution of the Association’s earnings — minus net expenses and necessary reserves — made to the cooperative’s stockholders. The board of directors determines annually if the Association will pay a patronage refund and the total amount of that refund.