Roughly 53% of federally insured credit unions had fewer members at the end of the second quarter of 2024 than they had a year earlier, according to the National Credit Union Administration.

The NCUA recently published its quarterly U.S. Map Review, which breaks down key credit union metrics by state.

And while total U.S. credit union membership increased by 2.4% in the second quarter, the median numbers tell a different story.

Medians represent the 50th percentile of the distribution of a metric. In other words, it is the point at which half of all credit unions had a value at or above while the other half had a value that was less than or equal to the midpoint.

Nationally, membership declined by 0.3% at the median during the year ending in the second quarter of 2024 compared to an increase of 0.2% at the median a year earlier.

The NCUA added that credit unions with falling membership tend to be small; more than half that saw declines had less than $50 million of assets in the second quarter.

Conversely, Navy Federal saw its membership climb by nearly 6.5% year over year to 13.8 million.

Over the year ending in the second quarter of 2024, credit unions headquartered in Alaska (3%) and New Mexico (2.2%) experienced the strongest median membership growth.

At the median, membership declined in 29 states during the year. New Jersey (-2%) and Arkansas (-1.4%) saw the largest median declines in membership during that time.

Credit unions in Michigan were down 0.2% in terms of median annual membership growth at the end of the second quarter.

One of those institutions, Gerber Federal Credit Union in Fremont, saw a 1.3% increase in year-over-year membership to nearly 16,000.

CEO John Buckley Jr. told Tyfone that for Gerber it is all about population growth, and Gerber is  growing with its local population.

“Given the challenging economic times, I find that potential members are more reluctant to shake up their finances as what they have now works for them,” Buckley said. “We only get a bump in membership when the local banks do something that drives their customers to us.”

In terms of lending,  loans outstanding rose by just 2.4% at the median over the year compared to 11% at the median a year earlier, the NCUA said.

“With today’s labor market, few employers are immune to the challenges of hiring. There is a massive array of potential workers out there who have paid their debt to society, or whose offenses are relatively minor.”

 – John Buckley Jr.
CEO
Gerber FCU