The NCUA should not issue any regulation for the next six months and should do a better job of justifying the need for any new rules. Those are among the requests that CUNA made in a 15-page letter sent late last week to NCUA Chairman Debbie Matz.

CUNA CEO Bill Cheney wrote that credit unions are overburdened by regulations and this is a good time to temporarily curb them because there "are no new, material systemic problems within the credit union system, current safety and soundness concerns within natural person and corporate credit unions seem to be manageable.''

Matz hasn't responded to the letter yet. When asked whether CUNA is optimistic about the prospects for the agency initiating a moratorium, CUNA Senior Vice President and Deputy General Counsel Mary Mitchell Dunn said today that "hope springs eternal.'' In his letter, Cheney also urged the agency to only issue regulations that address safety and soundness concerns, unless required by law to issue other ones. He also recommended that the NCUA seek input before issuing a rule about whether the rule is needed to address existing problems or "whether other approaches could be reasonable.''