100 Fun Facts About Credit Union

Who owns a credit union?

The depositors themselves own a credit union: every account holder is a member-owner, and it is the members, not outside shareholders or a parent company, who elect its board.

How are votes allocated when credit union members elect their board of directors?

One vote per member is the rule: a member holding only the minimum balance has the same say in electing the board as the biggest depositor, unlike a bank, where voting power follows stock ownership.

What is the credit union term for a savings deposit?

A share account is the credit union name for a basic savings deposit, because each deposit represents the member's ownership share; checking accounts are likewise called share draft accounts and CDs share certificates.

In several African countries, what is a credit union commonly called?

A SACCO, short for savings and credit co-operative organisation, is the usual name for a credit union in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania; a stokvel is a South African informal savings club, not a licensed co-operative.

Which German pioneer merged two Saxony pilot projects in 1852 into the first urban credit unions?

Franz Hermann Schulze-Delitzsch, a judge and liberal politician, founded the urban Volksbanken (credit associations for artisans and shopkeepers) in the early 1850s; Raiffeisen later adapted the model for farming villages.

Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen founded the first rural credit union in 1864 in which town?

Heddesdorf, a Rhineland village later absorbed into Neuwied, is where Raiffeisen set up the Heddesdorfer Darlehnskassen-Verein in 1864; by his death in 1888 the model had spread to Italy, France and Austria.

What was Raiffeisen's job while he pioneered rural credit unions?

Mayor of a succession of small Rhineland communities from 1845, Raiffeisen had left the Prussian army in 1843 because of an eye disease; failing health forced him to retire from office in 1865, aged 47.

What was credit union pioneer Alphonse Desjardins working as in 1897?

A parliamentary reporter: Desjardins took down House of Commons debates in Ottawa, and was spurred to act in 1897 on hearing of a Montrealer ordered to pay nearly $5,000 interest on a $150 loan.

What did Desjardins call the parish-based credit unions he developed for Quebec?

Caisses populaires was the name Desjardins gave them; he drew on European models but anchored each caisse in a Catholic parish, which supplied a ready-made community bond.

In which Quebec town did Desjardins found his first caisse populaire on December 6, 1900?

Lévis, on the south shore of the St. Lawrence opposite Quebec City, is where Desjardins founded the Caisse populaire de Lévis on December 6, 1900, the first of the movement's caisses.

The Desjardins Group holds what distinction in North America?

Largest federation of credit unions in North America: the Desjardins Group unites the Quebec and Ontario caisses built on Alphonse Desjardins's model into one cooperative network with its own federation and insurance arm.

Which institution was the first credit union in the U.S.?

French-speaking immigrants from Quebec founded it on November 24, 1908, with a personal visit from Desjardins to help.

Where did America's first credit union initially operate?

In the home of attorney Joseph Boivin: he volunteered both his house and his time, serving as the first manager, and the house was later turned into America's Credit Union Museum.

Which Boston department-store magnate is called the father of the U.S. credit union movement?

Edward Filene, owner of the Filene's department store, lobbied for the earliest state credit union laws and paid for the Credit Union National Extension Bureau out of his own pocket.

Which state passed America's first comprehensive credit union law, in 1909?

Massachusetts passed the Massachusetts Credit Union Act in 1909, the first general-purpose state law of its kind; its provisions later served as the template for the federal statute.

Whom did the movement's Boston benefactor hire in 1921 to run the Credit Union National Extension Bureau?

Roy Bergengren, a lawyer and First World War veteran, ran the bureau from 1921, edited its magazine The Bridge and went on to become the first managing director of the Credit Union National Association.

In what year was the Federal Credit Union Act signed into law?

1934: Franklin Roosevelt signed the Federal Credit Union Act on June 26 of that year, a Depression-era measure meant to make credit available to people of small means and to promote thrift.

What is the system called under which a credit union may hold a federal or state charter?

Dual chartering means a credit union can organize under federal law, supervised by the NCUA, or under its own state's law; state-chartered credit unions may also opt into federal share insurance.

The Credit Union National Association was founded in which Colorado town?

Estes Park hosted the meeting, held weeks after the Federal Credit Union Act became law, at which state credit union leagues confederated into the Credit Union National Association.

The 1934 act limited membership to groups sharing what?

A common bond of occupation, association or community was required of every federal credit union's members; the NCUA loosened that rule in the early 1980s to let one charter take in several unrelated groups, provoking the banking industry's lawsuit.

In what year did the U.S. Supreme Court side with banks against the NCUA's multiple-group membership policy?

1998 was the year: the Supreme Court's NCUA v. First National Bank & Trust ruling came in February, and Congress reversed it within months with new legislation restoring multiple-group membership.

What does NCUA stand for?

National Credit Union Administration is the independent federal agency that charters, supervises and insures federal credit unions, making it the counterpart of the FDIC for banks.

In what year was the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund created?

1970 saw Congress create the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund, the same year the old Bureau of Federal Credit Unions gave way to the independent NCUA; the fund carries the full faith and credit of the U.S. government.

How much share insurance does each member of a federally insured credit union have, at minimum?

$250,000 per member per ownership category is the NCUSIF limit, raised from $100,000 during the 2008 financial crisis and made permanent by the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010, matching the FDIC's limit for banks.

How many members sit on the NCUA board?

Three board members govern the NCUA, each appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate to a staggered six-year term; the agency also runs the Central Liquidity Facility.

Which is the largest U.S. credit union by both assets and membership?

Navy Federal, which began in 1933 as a credit union for Navy Department employees, is by a wide margin the largest U.S. credit union, with more than 10 million members and over $100 billion in assets.

In what year did the Navy Department employees' credit union become Navy Federal?

It had been incorporated in 1933 for Navy Department employees in Washington, D.C., and received a federal charter in 1947 before the 1954 expansion to all Navy officers.

In U.S. cooperative finance, what is a 'corporate' as opposed to a 'natural-person' institution?

One that serves other credit unions: a corporate credit union provides clearing, investment and liquidity services to retail credit unions; the two largest, U.S. Central and WesCorp, were seized by the NCUA in March 2009.

In which month is International Credit Union Day celebrated each year?

October: International Credit Union Day has been marked on the third Thursday of October since 1948, when the Credit Union National Association established the annual observance.

In U.S. credit union regulation, what does a 'field of membership' define?

Who is eligible to join is what a field of membership spells out; the NCUA approves each federal charter's field, whether it is defined by a shared employer, a membership organization or a home area.

Which country had the highest share of its economically active population in credit unions, at 82%?

Barbados topped the World Council's penetration table at 82% of its economically active population, ahead of Ireland at 75% and Grenada at 72%; Caribbean islands dominated the top of the list.

Where is the World Council of Credit Unions headquartered?

Madison, Wisconsin is home to the World Council of Credit Unions, which began operations on January 1, 1971 as the global trade body and development agency for credit unions; it also keeps an office in Washington, D.C.

US federal law caps a credit union's member business loans at what share of its assets?

12.25% of assets is the member business lending cap Congress wrote into federal law when it rewrote the membership rules in the late 1990s; loans under $50,000 do not count toward the limit.

Under which tax code section are state-chartered credit unions exempt from federal tax?

501(c)(14)(A) covers state-chartered credit unions, described in the code as credit unions 'without capital stock organized and operated for mutual purposes and without profit'; federal credit unions are exempt under 501(c)(1) as government instrumentalities.

How many federally insured credit unions were there at the end of 2024, according to the NCUA?

About 4,455 federally insured credit unions reported to the NCUA at the end of 2024, holding $2.31 trillion in assets for some 142 million members; mergers had been shrinking the count for decades.

PenFed, founded in 1935, originally served civilian and military employees of which federal department?

The War Department's civilian and military staff organized PenFed's forerunner in 1935; the institution later took the name Pentagon Federal Credit Union, shortened to PenFed, and grew into one of the largest federal credit unions.

Credit unions launched in which European country in 1992, growing to about 2,000 branches within two decades?

Poland's SKOK credit unions (spółdzielcze kasy oszczędnościowo-kredytowe) were launched in 1992 after the fall of communism and grew into one of Europe's largest credit union systems, with roughly two million members by the 2010s.

Which pastor of a Manchester, New Hampshire parish organized the first U.S. credit union in 1908?

Monseigneur Pierre Hevey, pastor of Sainte-Marie parish, wanted his French-Canadian mill-worker parishioners to be able to save and borrow at fair rates, and turned to Alphonse Desjardins for guidance.

Which trade body represents most credit unions in Great Britain?

ABCUL, the Association of British Credit Unions Limited, is the main trade association for credit unions in England, Scotland and Wales, itself constituted as a co-operative owned by its member credit unions.

Per the World Council of Credit Unions, why must a not-for-profit credit union still earn a small surplus?

To maintain capital and solvency: a credit union takes no donations, so income from loans and investments has to exceed operating costs and dividends, with the surplus retained as the reserves regulators require.

The biggest US credit union by assets is headquartered in which Virginia town?

Vienna, in Fairfax County, became the credit union's headquarters when it moved out of Washington, D.C. in 1977; its largest single campus, with thousands of staff, is in Pensacola, Florida.

The largest US credit union holds a single-sponsor charter under which federal body?

The Department of Defense is the sponsor; the credit union opened to the whole department in 2008, to the Coast Guard in 2013, to all veterans in 2017 and to Space Force members in 2020.

Which institution serves as the central bank for Germany's Volksbanken and Raiffeisenbanken?

DZ Bank (Deutsche Zentral-Genossenschaftsbank), based in Frankfurt, is the central institution of the German cooperative banking group, handling wholesale, capital-markets and clearing services for the local Volksbanken and Raiffeisenbanken.

At most how many NCUA board members may belong to the same political party?

Two is the limit: no more than two NCUA board members may come from the same political party, a bipartisan rule written into the Federal Credit Union Act alongside their staggered six-year terms.

How was the NCUSIF funded when it was created to insure deposits?

Solely by credit unions: the NCUSIF took no Treasury money at its creation, relying on premiums from insured credit unions, and in 1985 those institutions recapitalized it by depositing one percent of their insured shares.

Which 1998 law, H.R. 1151, reversed the Supreme Court's limit on multiple-group charters?

Credit Union Membership Access Act, signed by Bill Clinton that August, let a single federal charter serve multiple unrelated groups of up to 3,000 members each, overriding the Court's single-common-bond reading.

In US credit union jargon, what does the acronym CUSO stand for?

Credit Union Service Organization is the expansion: a CUSO is a company owned by one or more credit unions that provides services such as mortgage processing, IT or investment advice to credit unions or their members.

Whose 2008 election to lead Desjardins made it Canada's largest company headed by a woman?

Monique Leroux, a chartered accountant who had been a senior executive at Desjardins, was elected its president and chief executive in 2008 and served two four-year terms until 2016.

CUNA merged with NAFCU in 2024 to form which new trade association?

America's Credit Unions began operating on January 1, 2024, with Jim Nussle, CUNA's chief since 2014 and a former Iowa congressman, as president and CEO of the combined body.

Which senator sponsored the Federal Credit Union Act in the US Senate?

Morris Sheppard, a Texas Democrat, steered the Federal Credit Union Act through the Senate while Wright Patman, a fellow Texan, carried it in the House; Franklin Roosevelt signed it on June 26.

Golden 1 Credit Union paid $120 million over 20 years to name which NBA team's arena?

Sacramento Kings play at Golden 1 Center, which opened in downtown Sacramento in 2016 under a 20-year, $120 million naming deal the credit union signed in 2015.

Mountain America Stadium, renamed in a 2023 credit union deal, belongs to which college?

Arizona State agreed in 2023 to rename Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe as Mountain America Stadium under a 15-year deal with the Utah-based credit union, the stadium's first corporate naming since it opened in 1958.

Which credit union principle keeps your account open after you leave the sponsor employer?

Once a member, always a member: you keep your account after leaving the sponsor employer or moving out of the credit union's home area, though bylaws usually allow expulsion of anyone who causes it a loss.

Which Archbishop of Canterbury backed credit unions against payday lenders in 2013?

Justin Welby, enthroned that March, said he wanted to 'compete' payday lender Wonga 'out of existence' by helping credit unions, a pledge that drew heavy publicity as high-cost lending boomed in Britain.

Which Dutch cooperative bank grew out of a merger of Protestant and Catholic farmers' lending federations?

Rabobank's old full name, Coöperatieve Centrale Raiffeisen-Boerenleenbank, fused two rival farmers' bank federations, a Protestant-leaning one based in Utrecht and a Catholic one based in Eindhoven.

Which body has overall charge of regulating credit unions in the Irish Republic?

Central Bank of Ireland houses the Registrar of Credit Unions, the statutory regulator for the Republic's credit unions under the Credit Union Act 1997; the Irish League of Credit Unions is a trade body rather than a regulator.

Which body insures deposits at federally regulated Canadian credit unions?

Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation covers the handful of credit unions that took federal charters after a 2012 Bank Act amendment made them possible; provincially regulated credit unions rely on provincial deposit insurers instead.

In the CAMELS rating system used by the NCUA, what does the final S stand for?

Sensitivity to market risk is the S; CAMELS scores Capital, Asset quality, Management, Earnings, Liquidity and Sensitivity, and the NCUA added the sixth component to its old CAMEL system in 2022.

Which three-word phrase is the credit union movement's best-known motto?

People helping people is the motto used across the movement, summing up the idea of members pooling savings to lend to one another; it is the phrase credit unions put on International Credit Union Day materials.

Since 1995, more than 30 US credit unions have controversially converted into what?

Banks, usually mutual savings banks that can later issue stock, have been the destination for dozens of credit union conversions; critics say insiders profit from the stock offerings while members lose their ownership.

UNI Financial Cooperation, Canada's first federally chartered credit union, is based in which province?

New Brunswick is home to UNI Financial Cooperation, the Acadian cooperative network headquartered in Caraquet; it continued under the federal Bank Act on July 1, 2016, the first credit union in Canada to do so.

Which group did Vancity become the first BC lender to offer mortgages to, in 1961?

Women could get a Vancity mortgage without a male co-signer from 1961, a first for British Columbia; in 1986 the credit union also launched Canada's first socially responsible mutual fund, the Ethical Growth Fund.

The UK's first recorded credit union was formed in 1960 in which Northern Ireland city?

Derry Credit Union was formed in 1960 by a handful of founders pooling a few pounds of savings, inspired by the movement that had started across the border in the Republic two years earlier.

Alliant Credit Union was founded in 1935 to serve employees of which airline?

It kept the United Airlines Employees' Credit Union name until 2003, widening membership to other sponsors and communities around O'Hare.

Golden 1 was founded in 1933 as a credit union for which group?

California state employees were its founding members in 1933, when it opened as California State Employees' Credit Union #1 in Sacramento; it took the Golden 1 name in 1977.

Which computer maker's staff founded New England's biggest credit union in 1979?

Digital Equipment Corporation employees founded DCU in 1979 after staff complained to chief executive Ken Olsen that they struggled to get mortgages; the credit union kept the Digital name long after its sponsor was absorbed by Compaq.

Servus Credit Union, one of Canada's largest, is based in which province?

Alberta is home to Servus Credit Union, headquartered in Edmonton and built through a series of mergers among Alberta credit unions; it is the largest credit union in the province.

Which national trade body replaced Credit Union Central of Canada in 2016?

Canadian Credit Union Association took over from Credit Union Central of Canada in 2016 as the national trade association and advocate for credit unions outside the Desjardins network.

US federal credit unions are forbidden from charging what on loans?

Prepayment penalties are barred by the Federal Credit Union Act, which guarantees a borrower the right to repay a loan in whole or in part on any business day without penalty.

Which Nobel Peace laureate became the Irish League of Credit Unions' youngest president?

John Hume helped found his home city's credit union in 1960 and was elected president of the Irish League of Credit Unions at 27, its youngest; he said the credit union movement was the work he was proudest of.

Britain's first credit union, Hornsey Co-operative, was founded by migrants from where?

The Caribbean migrants of north London founded Hornsey Co-operative Credit Union in 1964, bringing a savings tradition from the West Indies, where credit union membership rates are among the world's highest.

The Antigonish Movement that seeded Maritime credit unions was run from which university?

St. Francis Xavier University's Extension Department, led by priests Jimmy Tompkins and Moses Coady, ran the movement from the town of Antigonish; the Coady International Institute was founded there in 1959.

What was Nora Herlihy's day job while she built Ireland's credit union movement?

National school teacher was her job: Herlihy taught at a primary school in Dublin, where she saw moneylenders prey on her pupils' families, and in 1958 helped found Ireland's first credit union in Donore Avenue.

Which Tolstoy novel mentions the work of German people's-bank pioneer Schulze-Delitzsch?

Anna Karenina mentions Schulze-Delitzsch's cooperative banks alongside Lassalle's rival ideas when Levin weighs how to reorganize labour on his estate, a sign of how far the German self-help model had travelled by the 1870s.

Louise Herring, the 'Mother of Credit Unions', managed which grocer's staff credit union?

Kroger's employee credit union in Cincinnati was managed by Herring, who attended the founding meeting of the Credit Union National Association as a Kroger delegate and went on to organize some 500 credit unions across Ohio.

Raiffeisen's 'three S' formula demanded self-help, self-governance and self-what?

Responsibility completes the trio — Selbsthilfe, Selbstverwaltung, Selbstverantwortung — because Raiffeisen held that members who govern and fund their own cooperative must also answer for its debts, hence the unlimited liability of early Raiffeisen societies.

Under the 1979 Act, UK credit unions had to register with which official?

Registrar of Friendly Societies was the official named in the Credit Unions Act 1979, which gave Great Britain its first specific credit union law; the registrar vetted each union's common bond and could strike one off the register.

Mountain America Credit Union was founded in the 1930s for workers in which industry?

Telephone service workers in Salt Lake City founded it as the Salt Lake Telephone Employees' Credit Union; it switched to a federal charter in 2003, when the Utah legislature moved to tax and restrict the state's largest credit unions.

Which 1977 federal law covers banks' lending to low-income areas but exempts credit unions?

Community Reinvestment Act obligations fall on FDIC-insured banks and thrifts; Congress left federally insured credit unions out of the 1977 law, a point bankers raise whenever they attack the credit union tax exemption.

In what year did the Utrecht Raiffeisen-Bank and Eindhoven Boerenleenbank merge?

1972 was the year the two federations merged into a single cooperative central bank; the combined organisation kept its head office in Utrecht but put its statutory seat in Amsterdam, neutral ground between the Protestant and Catholic camps.

France's Crédit Mutuel network traces back to an 1882 village bank near which city?

Strasbourg lies a few miles from La Wantzenau, the village where the first caisse rurale opened in 1882 while Alsace was under German rule; the network later took the Crédit Mutuel name.

In 1865 Luigi Luzzatti, the 'Schulze-Delitzsch of Italy', founded which cooperative bank?

Banca Popolare di Milano was the cooperative bank Luzzatti launched in 1865, a year after his first banca popolare at Lodi; he went on to serve as treasury minister and, in 1910–11, prime minister.

Anyonya, the subcontinent's earliest credit cooperative, began in 1889 in which princely state?

Baroda's Anyonya Sahakari Mandali, founded in 1889, is counted as the first cooperative credit society in India, predating the Co-operative Credit Societies Act of 1904 by fifteen years; the city was later renamed Vadodara.

Japan's shinkin banks bar companies with more than how many employees from joining?

300 employees is the ceiling: under the 1951 Shinkin Bank Act a company may join only if it has no more than 300 staff or capital of ¥900 million or less, though shinkin may take deposits from non-members.

Rules in Great Britain cap credit union loan interest at what rate per month?

3% a month, equivalent to 42.6% APR, has been the ceiling for credit unions in Great Britain since April 2014, when the government raised the old 2% cap so that small short-term loans could cover their costs.

Reserve Mines Credit Union, its province's first in 1932, was on which island?

Cape Breton Island's mining town of Reserve Mines, where Father Jimmy Tompkins was parish priest, opened the province's first credit union in 1932, and the Antigonish Movement's study clubs then spread credit unions across Atlantic Canada.

What was the title of Moses Coady's only book?

Masters of Their Own Destiny, published in 1939, tells the story of the Antigonish Movement; Coady urged Maritime audiences toward 'the good life', telling them they were 'poor enough to want it and smart enough to get it'.

Which body represents Australia's credit unions, mutual banks and building societies?

Customer Owned Banking Association (COBA) is the Australian industry body for credit unions, mutual banks and building societies; many of the country's larger credit unions rebranded as mutual banks in the 2010s.

BECU, Washington state's largest credit union, opened in 1935 under what name?

Fellowship Credit Union was the founding name chosen by the 18 Boeing employees who pooled their savings in 1935; the credit union opened membership to all Washington residents in 2002.

The number of US credit unions peaked at 23,866 in which year?

1969 was the peak year, with 23,866 credit unions; mergers and liquidations have since cut the count by more than four-fifths even as total membership passed 100 million in 2014.

Which three US states leave credit union regulation entirely to the federal government?

Delaware, South Dakota and Wyoming have no state credit union chartering law, so a credit union based in any of the three has to hold a federal charter; every other state offers its own charter alongside the federal one.

The NCUA's predecessor bureau was first housed inside which agency?

Farm Credit Administration first housed the federal credit union section; it moved to the FDIC in 1942, the Federal Security Agency in 1948 and Health, Education, and Welfare in 1953 before the NCUA became independent.

Credit union law co-author Pierre Jay became the first chairman of which body?

Federal Reserve Bank of New York opened in 1914 with Jay, a descendant of Founding Father John Jay and the former state bank commissioner who helped draft the 1909 credit union law, as its first chairman and Federal Reserve Agent.

Who founded Spolok Gazdovský, Europe's first cooperative credit society, in 1845?

Samuel Jurkovič, a teacher and notary in the village of Sobotište, founded the Gazdovský spolok in February 1845; it was wound up in 1851 but seeded Slovakia's cooperative movement.

Members of the 1845 Slovak farmers' cooperative had to do what every year?

Plant two trees in public was the rule: the society's statutes required each member to plant two trees each year in a public place and to lead a moral life, while loans were funded from members' regular savings.

Leone Wollemborg, the 'Raiffeisen of Italy', opened the first casse rurali in 1883 where?

Loreggia, a village in the countryside north of Padua, is where Wollemborg opened Italy's first cassa rurale in 1883, bringing the Raiffeisen village model to a country that had only urban popular banks.

Which Japanese reformer set up gojōkō village lending unions in the early 1800s?

Ninomiya Sontoku, the agrarian reformer known for his hōtoku teaching of repaying virtue, organized gojōkō mutual-aid loan societies among villagers in the early nineteenth century, pooling members' savings to lend to one another.

In what year did Ireland pass its first Credit Union Act?

1966 brought Ireland's first Credit Union Act, passed eight years after the movement's first union opened in 1958 and later replaced by the broader Credit Union Act 1997.

The John Deere Employees Credit Union of Waterloo, Iowa, later took what name?

Veridian Credit Union adopted that name in 2006, having earlier become John Deere Community Credit Union when it opened beyond the company's workforce; workplace charters like its original one were once the norm.

CUNA Mutual Group, the insurer serving US credit unions, rebranded in 2023 under what name?

TruStage became the name of CUNA Mutual Group in 2023; the insurer was founded in 1935 to sell loan-protection and life insurance through credit unions to their members.