ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- The NCUA Board this morning voted to assess credit unions a $1.06 billion assessment, much smaller than expected, but additional assessments are expected for at least the next two years.
The assessment amounts to a charge of 15 basis points and will pay to replenish reserves of the National CU Share Insurance Fund, and make the first of what is expected to be several payments on the newly created Corporate CU Stabilization Fund.
NCUA officials said they kept this year's assessment to a minimum because of the hard times most credit unions are currently experiencing, but more assessments are on the way.
"We've had a rough year in the current year, but our anticipation is we're going to have even more losses going into next year," said new NCUA Chairman Deborah Matz, who noted the growing number of troubled large credit unions.
Today's assessment includes a $727.5 million charge to replenish reserves for the NCUSIF and $336.8 million to pay interest on a $1 billion loan used to bail out U.S. Central FCU, which was taken under conservatorship by NCUA on March 20.
But Melinda Love, chief examiner at the credit union agency, projected additional assessments to fund the corporate stabilization over the next few years. "It's likely 2010 or 2011 we may do more than one assessment," she said. Additional assessments for the NCUSIF separately for 2010 and 2011 are also likely, she added.
"We cannot specify a premium (now) because there are too many variables we do not know," said NCUA Board member Gigi Hyland.
