Risk and compliance

Record keeping requirement

Also called Record keeping and audits, document retention.

8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(E)(vii)(I) makes every regional center preserve the books, ledgers, records and other documentation of the regional center, the new commercial enterprise and the job-creating entity for five years beginning on the last day of the federal fiscal year in which the transactions occurred.

What it decides

Those records have to support two things: any claim, evidence or certification in the center's annual statements on Form I-956G, and the associated investor petitions for classification and for removal of conditions under 8 U.S.C. 1186b. Subclause (II) says what the retention buys USCIS. The Secretary must audit each regional center not less frequently than once every five years, reviewing the documentation held under subclause (I) for the preceding five years and the flow of investor capital into any capital investment project, and may cover several centers in one visit where they sit at a single site. Subclause (III) then makes termination mandatory for a center that fails to consent to an audit or deliberately attempts to impede one. Securities records run on a different clock. Under 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(I)(iii)(II) their five years start on the date each record was created, not at fiscal year end, and the center must produce them to DHS or to the Securities and Exchange Commission on request.

Governed by 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(E)(vii), "Record keeping and audits", subclause (I) record keeping, (II) audits and (III) termination, quoted verbatim from the govinfo United States Code 2023 edition of section 1153 and reconfirmed against the 2024 edition; 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(I)(iii), "Oversight required", subclauses (I) to (III), for the separate securities record clock; 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(G) for the annual statements the records must support, which USCIS collects on Form I-956G. Read 5 August 2026.

Related terms

Regional centerA regional center is an economic unit, public or private, that USCIS has designated to sponsor pooled EB-5 investment within a defined, contiguous and limited geographic area, and it is the only route on which a petition may count indirect and induced jobs.
Form I-956GForm I-956G, Regional Center Annual Statement, is the yearly filing every designated regional center must submit to support its continued eligibility for designation, accounting for investor capital, project progress, fees collected from investors and required compliance certifications.
Compliance auditA compliance audit, which USCIS calls a regional center audit, is the review USCIS must conduct on every designated regional center at least once every five years under 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(E)(vii)(II), examining the records the center must keep and the flow of investor capital into its capital investment projects.
Fund administrationFund administration is the duty under 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(Q) for a new commercial enterprise to hold each investor's capital in a separate insured United States account and to retain an independent fund administrator over that account. The account requirement cannot be waived; the administrator can be, either by an annual GAAS financial audit shared with DHS and every investor, or by a discretionary waiver where an SEC registered adviser or broker-dealer controls the enterprise.

Checked against primary sources on 10 August 2026. Back to the glossary