ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The NCUA Board this morning approved a 12% increase in spending for next year, with most of the increased costs dedicated to additional examiner hires to cope with growing losses among credit unions.
NCUA also estimated growing losses among corporate and natural person credit unions are likely to require credit unions to pay dual assessments of about 25 basis points, or as much as $2 billion next year, about the same as this year. The agency said the dual costs of the corporate bailout and National CU Share Insurance Fund premium are projected to be between 20 bps and 35 bps, with a mid-range of the 26 bps credit unions paid this year.
The spending increase will go to hire an additional 75 examiners, mostly to implement the agency's annual examination scheduling, and comes after NCUA hired about 80 new examiners this year. It will also go to pay average pay raises of 5% for NCUA's 1,200 personnel, with some employees due to earn a smuch as 8% raises. The budget for next year is $225.4 million, up $24.5 million from this year's.
NCUA also issued for comment proposed amendments to its new corporate rule that would require corporate boards and management to attest to the accuracy of their financial reporting — similar to requirements under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and record all board votes. The proposals, issued for a 30-day comment period, will also limit credit unions to membership in a single corporate and allow corporates to raise new funds by charging membership fees and assessing privately insured credit union members a portion of NCUA's corporate bailout assessments.
