WASHINGTON – CUNA said this afternoon that credit unions added an estimated 40,000 new members and as much as $80 million in new deposits on Saturday, Bank Transfer Day.
The new membership figures, compiled from a survey of 1,100 credit unions, comes on top of an estimated 650,000 members added in the four weeks prior.
The survey indicates that about four in every five of larger credit unions signed up new members on Nov. 5 – some signing up hundreds on that day. Many respondents indicated that they kept branches open that were typically closed on Saturdays, and/or that they extended Saturday office hours generally.
More than 60% percent of the credit unions reporting signing up new members on Nov. 5 also said they had made new loans on that day. CUNA estimates that, overall, those credit unions made about $90 million in new loans on “Bank Transfer Day,” to both new and existing members
CUNA President Bill Cheney said the survey response indicates momentum that credit unions realized in the weeks leading up to “Bank Transfer Day” continued right into Nov. 5 itself, with a specific spike in membership on that day.
“Since Sept. 29 – the day Bank of America announced its now-rescinded monthly $5 debit card fee – average estimated membership increases nationally were around 20,000 new members each day, “ Cheney said. “On Saturday, consumers doubled the pace. It’s clear that consumers kept up their interest in credit unions.”
