ARLINGTON, Va. – As credit unions approach the middle of 2006, the industry's credit card statistics offer a mixed and interesting picture. First, mergers and credit card portfolio sales are not dramatically lowering the numbers of CUs which offer cards, but they are lowering them somewhat. Year over year since 2004, the percentage of CUs offering credit cards has dropped just about 1%, according to the data.
And of the remaining CUs which continue to hold cards, the stats show that none of them appear to manage their cards to their greatest potential.
For example, while the list of CUs with the most credit card assets contains a few surprises, overall it's not a great surprise that the nation's largest would have the largest credit card balances. But it is somewhat surprising that none of the CUs on the list of most credit card assets show up as leaders in card penetration?
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Now, the card penetration numbers can have some problems since not all CUs count their card portfolios the same way. Some count all card accounts and some only count the card accounts which have been active in the last three cycles. Further, card penetration generally lags other indicators since CU members generally establish other relationships with their credit unions before they take their cards.
Statistics also show that while credit unions' card portfolios hover around 4% of their total loans; some CUs have card programs which make up an important part of their card portfolio.
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