A potentially less aggressive stance with deposit pricing and meeting asset growth targets as a result of the net worth ratio impact of NCUSIF assessments could affect membership growth, according to CUNA Mutual Group's latest Trends Report.

Membership gains are traditionally seen in the early part of the year as newly-funded marketing budgets help to sign up additional select employer groups and attract new members, the report noted. Through the first two months of 2009, CUs added 627,000 members with an estimated 91.4 million members at the end of February. CUNA Mutual indicated that it is more than halfway to meeting its early 2009 forecast of 1.1 million new members in 2009.

"While this reflects normal seasonality of data, we will be looking closely at our model assumptions to see if they accurately reflect market and economic conditions, Dave Colby, chief economist at CUNA Mutual, wrote in the report. "Given the adverse net worth ratio impact of NCUSIF assessments, we believe [credit unions] will be less aggressive with deposit pricing and asset growth targets while at the same time closely monitoring every expense basis point."