Black-owned banks, frequently classified by federal regulatory agencies as Minority Depository Institutions (MDIs), are specialized financial institutions where majority ownership rests with African American individuals or where the board of directors and primary service communities are predominantly Black. Historically emerging out of post-Civil War reconstruction and the Reconstruction era's financial experiments, these institutions play a critical role in providing non-predatory mortgages, small business loans, and basic banking services to historically underserved communities that have faced systemic redlining and credit exclusion.