Firefighter Credit Union Newsroom

 WASHINGTON—The rate of credit union membership growth during 2021 was slightly better than that of 2020, while lending grew at its fastest pace in 17 years, according to Callahan & Associates. The company shared the insights on the addition of more than 4.8-million new members (3.8% growth) last year  and other data points during a recent quarterly Trendwatch webinar. Among the other key highlights from the Callahan & Associates’ analysis: Annual Loans Growing At Fastest Rate In 17 Years For the first time since 2019, the rate at which annual loans have grown has outpaced the growth of shares, the company said. “Loan growth rose to 11.7%, up over 7% from last year’s growth. The loan portfolio is currently growing at the fastest annual rate since 2005,” Callahan’s reported. “Share growth slowed to 9.3%, down from the extraordinary 23.1% growth rate seen in the prior year.” Credit unions are also keeping more loans on their balance sheet, acc...

Banking's future is shaping up to be dramatically different — in as few as three years. According to a survey of financial institution leaders worldwide, customer experience improvements, competitive changes, and an accelerated flight to digital channels, along with several surprising additional factors, will massively transform the industry. By Jim Marous , Co-Publisher of The Financial Brand , CEO  The pace of change in banking is already startling. Financial institutions are working overtime to leverage digital transformation for increased efficiencies, improved experiences and revised business models. But what do banking leaders from around the world believe will happen by 2025 … only three short years from now? To answer questions around the speed of digital banking transformation, the Digital Banking Report asked over 400 financial institution executives to provide their projections as to what will happen in next three years. Our global research included not onl...

  By Mike Moebs Who was the best quarterback of the economy?  Since 1914 there have been 15 Federal Reserve chairs. The most fundamental way to measure the performance of the Fed quarterbacks in the past 108 years is to gauge if money supply advanced in line with the normal rate of monetary growth.  In 1946 Congress gave the Federal Reserve the dual mandate to control inflation and maximize employment to promote economic stability. However, this is like rating a teacher based on the number of A’s awarded and how many students attended class every day. Judging a teacher by these quotas is not a good measure of their performance or impact on their students’ learning. What do you think of a teacher who gives out all A’s? Moebs $ervi...

  New Orleans Firemen’s Federal Credit Union is proud to announce Chief Executive Officer Judy DeLucca has been selected by Inclusiv as an Annie Vamper Award recipient. Inclusiv's mission is to help low- and moderate-income people and communities achieve financial independence through credit unions. The award recognizes individuals who are making extraordinary contributions to the community development credit union (CDCU) movement and is named for Annie Vamper, who dedicated her life to serving low- and moderate-income people through credit unions. Inclusiv is delighted to once again honor the legacy of Annie Vamper through these three incredible community development credit union trailblazers. “We are very proud of Judy and her team for all the work they do for our communities,” stated Board Chairperson Joseph Jurisich. “Judy is an excellent example of the ‘people helping people’ spirit our credit union was built upon. We appreciate her invaluable leadership and gui...

The NCUA has told credit unions they can use the technology behind cryptocurrency as long as they follow NCUA principles to ensure compliance with existing regulations and don’t create undue risk. NCUA Chairman Todd Harper’s four-page letter sent Thursday to federally insured credit unions said the NCUA does not prohibit credit unions from employing distributed ledger technology (DLT), which is used to support cryptocurrencies, “if it is deployed for permissible activities and in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations, including applicable state laws or state supervisory authority requirements.” “As with the development of any new product or service when deploying a platform, product or service using DLT as part of the underlying technology, credit unions should find an appropriate balance between the opportunities and the risks,” Harper wrote. “This letter also signals to the broader financial and technology communities that credit unions are a market to ...

 ARLINGTON, Va.—New home sales fell 16.6% in April to 591,000 annualized units, while March saw a downward revision of 54,000 units. The sales slowdown comes even as rates have declined nationally for a second straight week. Curt Long, NAFCU Compared to last year, April sales were 26.9% lower, reported NAFCU Chief Economist and Vice President of Research Curt Long. “Rising rates and high prices are putting the brakes on a market that had significant momentum just a few months ago,” said Long. “While the total number of homes for sale grew by 8.3% in April to 444,000, only 38,000 of those homes are complete. The supply chain and la...

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COVID has changed the employment landscape in the last few years and will continue to have an impact for years to come.  With over 81 million people diagnosed with COVID, according to the AMA, it is estimated that 10-30% of those patients will develop residual symptoms or medical complications, known as long COVID, for months or years to come. Long COVID can be a life-changing disability Employees may unknowingly be suffering from symptoms that can impact their ability to work such as chronic fatigue, brain fog, mental illness, chronic shortness of breath, migraines, and other complex medical issues.  COVID is not just a respiratory disease, but a multi-systemic inflammatory disease, and employers need to understand their social and legal obligations to their employees. Failure to understand these obligations can be costly to employers directly from discrimination lawsuits, workplace injuries or other liability for other accidents caused by employees or product l...

 By DAMIAN J. TROISE and STAN CHOE NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street rumbled to the edge of a bear market Friday after another drop for stocks briefly sent the S&P 500 more than 20% below its peak set early this year. The S&P 500 index, which sits at the heart of most workers’ 401(k) accounts, was down as much as 2.3% for the day before a furious comeback in the final hour of trading sent it to a tiny gain of less than 0.1%. It finished 18.7% below its record, set on Jan. 3. The tumultuous trading capped a seventh straight losing week, its longest such streak since the dot-com bubble was deflating in 2001. Rising interest rates, high inflation, the war in Ukraine, and a slowdown in China’s economy are all punishing stocks and raising fears about a possible U.S. recession. Compounding worries is how the superhero that’s flown to Wall Street’s rescue in the most recent downturns, the Federal Reserve, looks less likely to help as it’s stuck battling the worst inflatio...

 The real estate market showed further signs of weakening in April as existing home sales fell for the third month in a row under the weight of higher prices and rising mortgage rates. The National Association of Realtors on Thursday reported that sales of single-family homes, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops slid 2.4% from March to a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 5.61 million in April. Sales fell 5.9% from the 5.96 million SAAR in April 2021. Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist, said buyer activity was reduced by higher home prices and sharply higher mortgage rates. “It looks like more declines are imminent in the upcoming months, and we’ll likely return to the pre-pandemic home sales activity after the remarkable surge over the past two years,” Yun said. Lawrence Yun Curt Long, NAFCU’s chief economist and vice president of research, said he expects home sales totals to trend flat this year due to higher rates and inventory shortages. “Despite the...

  Editor’s Note: This opinion piece by Joy Peterson, CEO of the $44.2-million Bessemer System FCU in Greenville, Penn. was first published on ChipFilson.com. It is reprinted here with permission. By Joy Peterson  Continue Reading

The word "accountability" gets a bad rap in business circles. We often associate it with blame or punishment, making leaders hesitant to talk about it, let alone put it into action on their teams. But it doesn't have to be like that. In her book Unstuck: Reframe Your Thinking to Free Yourself From the Patterns and People That Hold You Back , author and TEDx speaker Lia Garvin proposes an alternative perspective for leaders and managers to think about accountability on teams. Shift to a mindset of an owner To bring this leadership perspective to life, Garvin suggests considering the metaphor of owning versus renting a home. For example, when you're renting an apartment and something breaks, you call the landlord. They hire the repair person, and they ultimately foot the bill. When you're the owner, it's on you -- not only because you're ultimately responsible, but because you take pride in the home you own, and want the repair to be done right. O...

CUNA- and NAFCU-supported bills that passed the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday would expand field of membership for all federal credit unions to add underserved areas and would create a permanent fix for CDFI funding. The two pieces of legislation, the Expanding Financial Access for Underserved Communities Act and the CDFI Bond Guarantee Program Improvement Act, will now advance to the full House of Representatives for consideration. According to details of the Expanding Financial Access for Underserved Communities Act (H.R. 7003), the bill would allow all federal credit unions to include underserved areas to their field of membership – adding areas not within 10 miles of a branch to the definition of an underserved area. “Today, lawmakers chose to put credit unions and the consumers they serve first. Advancing the NAFCU-backed Expanding Financial Access for Underserved Communities Act is a step forward in helping the credit union industry expand suppor...

  The Mortgage Bankers Association on Monday lowered forecasts again for originations – for both this year and next, and for purchases and refinancings. Bob Broeksmit, the MBA’s president/CEO, told lenders Monday that the mortgage boom of the last two years is over, and now lenders need be ready to handle smaller volumes. “After the stratospheric heights of 2020 and 2021, the market is coming back down to earth,” Broeksmit said in prepared remarks for those attending the MBA’s 2022 Secondary & Capital Markets Conference & Expo in New York. “To a certain extent, the headwinds we expected have finally arrived,” he said. “Rising rates are putting pressure on new loans and refis, and after ramping up, the focus is now on scaling down.” The May 16 forecast , which was released separately, showed MBA analysts have lowered their expectations of economic growth and sales of existing homes, while raising their expectations for mortgage interest rat...

 WASHINGTON–Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who headed the central bank during the 2008 financial crisis, is now warning that the United States is headed for a situation similar to that of the 1970s, when Americans were losing their jobs but still facing higher prices at the grocery store and at the pump. Ben Bernanke “Even under the benign scenario, we should have a slowing economy,” Bernanke told the New York Times in an interview in conjunction with his new book, “ 21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve From the Great Inflation to Covid-19 ,” which is scheduled to publish today. “So, there should be a period in the next year...

Reflect on who your members are, what they need, and what they are trying to achieve with faster payments. Over the last decade, the financial services industry has changed considerably as community banks and credit unions evolve their product offerings to keep up with consumer expectations. The faster payments movement is the latest example of this. In the current economic climate, having access to funds in real-time is now more important than ever, both for consumers and small and medium-sized enterprises. According to a recent survey of 2,010 U.S. businesses by the Federal Reserve, 90% expect to use faster payments in their operations by 2023, and many are ready for that upgrade now. Meanwhile, 30% of consumers say access to real-time payments is a key factor when selecting a financial institution and nearly 25%  would be willing to switch to an institution that offers them, according to new research from PYMNTS.com. While implementing new payments technologies and ...

  By Ray Birch IRVINE, Calif.—There’s little chance the Federal Reserve will steer the U.S. away from a recession in the next 12-18 months, says one economist, who adds delinquencies among the nation’s lenders could become an issue in the near future. Elliot Eisenberg, chief economist for economic consultancy GraphsandLaughs, said during a recent Origence webcast he does not think the recession will be deep. But he also urged credit unions to revisit loan loss reserves built during the pandemic and to shore those up again. What the growth of inflation will come down to, explained Eisenberg, is whether the Federal Reserve, as it adjusts rates upward to curb inflation, will be able to engineer a “soft landing” for the econo...

ARLINGTON, Va.–NCUA should immediately raise the permissible interest rate ceiling to mitigate unnecessary interest rate risks facing federal credit unions, NAFCU told the agency in a letter . Vice President of Regulatory Affairs Ann Kossachev urged the agency to establish a floating permissible interest rate ceiling equal to a 15% spread over the prime rate or, alternatively extend the 18% permissible interest rate ceiling for the maximum allowable period of 18 months, no fewer than 90 days before its scheduled expiration on March 10, 2023. Under the Federal Credit Union (FCU) Act, the trade group noted that the NCUA board, in coordination with Treasury, relevant congressional committees, and other federal agencies, has authority to raise the...

ATLANTA–The median U.S. household needed 42.9 weeks of income as of March 2022 to purchase an average-priced vehicle, according to the latest Cox Automotive/Moody’s Analytics Vehicle Affordability Index. This is up 18% since last year, and 26% in the past two years, and compares to a 5% decrease from 2012 through 2019, the company said, adding that decade-high interest rates caused a significant increase in the cost of borrowing, which offset the positive effect of the transaction price decline and rising incomes. Among the findings in the latest Vehicle Affordability Index: Interest rates on 72-month new auto loans in March, as estimated by Moody’s Analytics, reached their highest level in more than a decade. Interest rates are rising in re...

Do a quick scan of TikTok and you’ll find trendy young people casually blowing hundreds or thousands of dollars on clothes and jewelry, often set to the clattering, bass-boosted din of Florida rapper Saucy Santana’s fittingly titled “Material Girl.” Plenty of those influencers get the goods they flaunt for free. But if you don’t have the followers, or the up-front cash to blow, TikTokers have a tip: Just use “buy now, pay later” services, the hottest new way to take on debt. You may have seen some of these names — Klarna, Sezzle, Zip (formerly Quadpay), Afterpay and Affirm — pop up as you shop online, presenting an easier, more seamless alternative to having to type out your credit card information again and again. With a few clicks and a small down payment, you’ll have what you ordered on hand — all you need to do now is complete your four payments. The services, also known as point-of-sale loans, are heavily marketed b...

  As the Reserve Bank expresses concern about the scale and profitability of small finance businesses, firefighters will vote today on the very survival of their credit union The introduction of a law setting in place $100,000 deposit guarantees can't come soon enough for members of the NZ Firefighters Credit Union, whose much-loved institution is on the brink of failure. Firefighters will vote today on whether to transfer their business to the bigger NZCU Auckland or, if they can't agree on that, whether to call in the liquidators. It comes as the Reserve Bank warns in its Financial Stability Report of the low returns on assets in the country's diminishing number of credit unions. Adrian Orr tells Newsroom: "Over recent times, they have been quite significantly challenged on scale and profitability." Ever since the $380 million Government bail-out of BNZ in 1990, successive ministers have treated the big banks as "too big to fail". Th...

 HOUSTON–  Dolphin Debit , a full-service ATM management company, said it has entered into a strategic partnership with Credit Union Services, Inc. (CUSI), the Service Corporation of the MD|DC Credit Union Association. “Through the strategic partnership, CUSI adds a budget-ready, industry-leading ATM management program to its portfolio of solutions for credit unions in the Maryland and D.C. region,” Dolphin Debit said. According to Dolphin Debit, its ATM outsourcing service includes purchase and deployment of new ATMs, purchase of the financial institution’s existing ATMs, terminal driving, transaction processing, ATM maintenance, armored car service, communications, monitoring and dispatch, and cash management. “We welcome this oppor...

WASHINGTON—As expected, the Federal Reserve Wednesday increased its benchmark interest rate by 50 basis points. The hike was the largest single increase in the last 20 years, a move the Fed and analysts have stated is necessary to fight high inflation. During its meeting Wednesday, the Fed also outlined a program in which it eventually will be reducing its bond holdings by $95 billion a month. “The Committee decided to raise the target range for the federal funds rate to three fourths to 1% percent and anticipates that ongoing increases in the target range will be appropriate,” the Fed noted in a statement. In addition, the Committee decided to begin reducing its holdings of Treasury securities and agency debt and agency mortg...