WENTZVILLE, Mo. -- 1st Financial FCU brought in nearly $460,000 in auto loans as part of a Black Friday promotion this year, repeating a similar special from 2011.

CLEVELAND – Anthony Raguz, the CEO of St. Paul Croatian FCU, was sentenced this morning to 14 years in prison and ordered to pay $72 million restitution for masterminding the biggest fraud in credit union history that led to the 2010 collapse of the $240 million credit union.

APPLETON, Wis. – NCUA has approved a credit union charter for Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, a $480 million bank that used to be a credit union which will now be known as Thrivent FCU.

OGDEN, Utah – Goldenwest CU is one of the first credit unions to announce a holiday bonus this year, with members due a bonus dividend of 4.35% APY.

MILWAUKEE, Wis.—Police and the FBI are looking for a group of robbers suspected of hitting eight credit union and bank locations in this area, the latest being a branch of Landmark Credit Union.

PENSACOLA, Fla. –Florida Gov. Rick Scott toured Navy Federal's growing call center here, which continues to expand.

A group of community activists is calling on the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency Tuesday to give Wells Fargo a failing grade on its upcoming Community Reinvestment Act examination, citing its lending practices in minority communities and a "usurious" payday-like loan product.

Florida Credit Union Shared Services has named Michael Yatros as its new CEO. Yatros was previously EVP with PSCU Financial Services, St. Petersburg, Fla.

A Texas bank's court challenge claiming that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is unconstitutional is wildly speculative and baseless, the Department of Justice said this week.

WEOKIE Credit Union member James Liles has won $25,000 after successfully kicking a 35-yard field goal at promotion held during an Oklahoma State University football game.

Matthew Davidson, well known to many for his efforts to lead the recapitalization of the former Wescorp, has returned to his home state to take over as CFO at Wright-Patt Credit Union.

Financial institutions that have been earning record profits from home loans are adding or transferring thousands of staff to catch up with demand for refinancing after shortages blocked homeowners from getting lower rates.

National home values continued their year-long climb as prices rose in October for the twelfth consecutive month, according to Zillow.

The Mortgage Bankers Association said its index of mortgage activity, which includes both refinances and purchase activity, fell 2.2% for the week ended Nov. 16 from a week earlier.

The housing industry, lenders and consumer groups are all raising alarms over an obscure but critical provision in the law that is set to expire at the end of the year unless Congress passes a bill to continue it in the next few weeks.

Redstone FCU has opened its first Right Choice Money Services store, which will offer low priced, basic financial services, including check cashing, money orders, money transfers, bill pay, and reloadable prepaid cards.

In this issue and next, Credit Union Journal is featuring Best Practices, so I’ve assembled my own Top 10 from SAFE Credit Union, beginning with the first five.

As more credit unions venture into the commercial real estate market, having an environmental risk management policy becomes increasingly important for many reasons.

The Ohio CU League has launched a new website with a goal of making league resources more accessible, streamlining OCUL’s ability to obtain CU feedback, and encouraging collaboration among credit unions in this state.

Both CU trade associations are questioning NCUA’s 2013 proposed budget, with CUNA terming the agency’s move “exasperating” while NAFCU contends the amount is hard to justify.