This week, CreditUnions.com finds two credit unions looking to go short to meet long-term goals, another institution with a data strategy now taking flight, and analyzes the performance of credit unions in four states.
Here are five can’t-miss data points:
17.5%
Interest rates have hovered near historic lows for a decade, making it more efficient, and more member friendly, for credit unions to deploy capital in other ways. In the past five years, the percentage of investments to total industry assets has declined from 26.8% to 17.5%. The percentage of loans to total assets, on the other hand, has increased more than 10 percentage points in the same timeframe. But even as credit unions moved away from the markets, the investment philosophy of this conservative bunch held steady.
Read: To Meet Long-Term Goals, 2 Credit Unions Go Short
5
Member intelligence is driving an evolution in the member experience at Wings Financial Credit Union, which has gone all-in on using data to act and serve. The credit union is gleaning insight from personal interactions in person and digitally and actively building its internal analytics skills while working closely with vendors advancing their own offerings in machine learning, artificial intelligence, and visualization software. Here, Wing’s identifies five areas of opportunity in member intelligence.
Read: Data Takes Flight At Wings Financial
2.8%
2018 was a great year for credit unions nationwide. On the back of a strong economy, with GDP up 2.8% over the year and unemployment levels at record lows, credit unions strengthened member relationships and expanded their balance sheets. In the current climate, cooperatives are reporting notable gains in income and loan but are increasingly facing liquidity pressures. Read on to dive into credit unions performance at the end of 2018.
Read: Credit Union Industry At-A-Glance (4Q18)
$42.6 Billion
Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Texas credit unions reported record loan originations in 2018, reflecting the positive industry momentum nationwide that saw improvements on both sides of the balance sheet. With auto lending leading the way, the 570 credit unions in those three states saw total loan originations increase 4.1% annually to $42.6 billion as of Dec. 31, 2018, according to data culled from the movement’s 5300 Call Reports and analyzed by Callahan & Associates for the quarterly report commissioned by the Cornerstone Credit Union League.
Read more: Cornerstone League Cooperatives Corral Another Strong Year
74,000
Ohio’s credit unions shared in the solid performance turned in during the fourth quarter of 2018 by the nation’s member-owned financial cooperatives. Positive metrics were recorded in all the major metrics culled from the movement’s 5300 Call Reports and analyzed by Callahan & Associates for the quarterly report commissioned by the Ohio Credit Union League. They begin with the heart of the movement: Some 74,700 new members joined the 264 credit unions based in the Buckeye State, a year-over-year growth rate that pushed total membership to 3 million.
Read: Buckeye State Credit Unions Ended The Year Strong
Happy Reading!
