Few instances of regulatory guidance have created the same stir among credit unions as the NCUA's proposed risk-based capital rule.

But even fewer financial analyses have been as confusing as the one comparing NCUA's explanation of what it considers the true costs of the rule to both CUNA's and NAFCU's accusations of the economic burden credit unions will bear if the proposal passes.

The discussions to date have quite literally been a case of comparing NCUA's relatively small and conservative apples to the trade groups' really big eggplant, and it's clear that there's little hope of harvesting an equal comparison.