Expanded Regulatory Relief Eligibility for Small and Non-Complex Credit Unions
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- Expanded NCUA’s regulatory exemptions for credit unions with assets of less than $100 million (up from $10 million in 2012)
- Eased compliance requirements for small credit unions to access emergency liquidity
- More than doubled the number of small credit unions eligible for regulatory relief in future NCUA rulemakings (4,500 out of 6,000 CUs)
- Exempted non-complex credit unions (75 percent of all CUs) from risk-based capital requirements
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Eliminated Fixed Assets Cap
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- Eliminated federal credit unions’ 5 percent cap on fixed assets
- Removed the need to apply for regulatory waivers
- Empowering federal credit unions to make their own business decisions on purchases of land, buildings, office equipment, and technology
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Pre-Approved Associational Common Bonds
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- Pre-approved 12 categories of associations that federal credit unions may automatically add to their fields of membership:
- alumni associations
- athletic booster clubs
- Chamber of Commerce groups
- electric cooperatives
- ethnic organizations
- fraternal organizations
- homeowners’ associations
- labor unions
- occupational organizations
- parent-teacher associations
- religious organizations
- scouting groups
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Expanding Fields of Membership
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- Proposed a modernized field of membership rule to:
- Designate each Congressional District as a well-defined local community
- Serve Combined Statistical Areas with populations up to 2.5 million
- Raise potential membership to 1 million for federal credit unions in rural areas
- Extend membership eligibility to honorary discharged veterans, contractors, and businesses in industrial parks
- Recognize full-service websites and electronic applications as service facilities for select employee groups
- Modernize the definition of “underserved area”
- Finalized a principles-based rule on member business lending to:
- Remove non-statutory limits on member business loans
- Empower each credit union to write their own business loan policy and set their own limits under the law
- Eliminate the requirement for all business owners to pledge personal guarantees
- Remove unnecessary barriers on business loan participations which help credit unions diversify risks
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Eased Troubled Debt Restructuring
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- Facilitated credit union loan modifications
- Ended manual reporting of modified loans
- Prevented unnecessary foreclosures
- Kept more credit union members in their homes throughout the housing crisis
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Authorized “Plain Vanilla” Derivatives
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- Permits qualified federal credit unions to use “plain vanilla” derivatives to reduce interest rate risks
- Protects the credit union system from interest rate risks at large credit unions by providing an additional interest rate risk mitigation tool
- Allows approved federal credit unions to maintain appropriate levels of mortgage loans in portfolios
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Approved Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities
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- Offers federal credit unions an additional investment backed by the Federal Government with zero credit risk
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Established Charitable Donation Accounts
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- Empowers federal credit unions to safely pool investments designed to primarily benefit national, state, or local charities
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Eliminating Full Occupancy Requirement
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- Proposed eliminating a requirement that federal credit unions must plan for and eventually reach full occupancy of acquired premises
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