Over Half of the Credit Unions Reported Fewer Members Compared to A Year Earlier

While overall credit union membership continued to grow during the year ending in the third quarter of 2016, more than half of the credit unions in the country lost members over the last twelve months, according to the National Credit Union Administration.

Fifty-one percent of federally insured credit unions had fewer members at the end of the third quarter of 2016 than a year earlier.

The median membership growth rate was a negative 0.1 percent over the previous year.

Twenty-two states had negative median membership growth. This means more than half of the federally-insured credit unions in those 22 states had fewer members compared to a year ago.

At the median, year-over-year membership declined the most in Pennsylvania (-1.6 percent) and Oklahoma (-1.3 percent). Three other states reported negative year-over-year membership growth rate of one percent or more at the median -- North Dakota (-1 percent), Montana (-1.1 percent), and New Jersey (-1.2 percent).

Approximately 75 percent of credit unions with declining membership had assets of less than $50 million.