Hampered by what it said are the NCUA's restrictive field of membership regulations, the $318 million GCS FCU of Granite City, Ill., said Thursday it has won approval to become a state charter and will convert in 60 days.
The move fulfills a need to be more competitive in metro St. Louis with other larger state credit unions that have managed to branch into many more Illinois counties, said GCS President/CEO Mark Holshouser.
“We have been kind of stuck under a federal charter in expanding into surrounding counties,” Holshouser said.
Under a state charter, GCS can reach beyond St. Clair and Madison counties to eight other surrounding Illinois counties outside St. Louis.
GCS has 39,000 members and seven branches and is now considering new branches and electronic banking products to reach the new market, said Holshouser.
“Our board will be holding a strategic planning session next week to start looking at what we might do,” said Holshouser.
Larger credit unions like the $851 million Scott Credit Union of Collinsville and the $493 1st MidAmerica Credit Union in Bethalto, he said, have been able to expand their geographic footprint and become more competitive with GCS.
GCS members approved the charter switch June 7. Holshouser said he was unfamiliar with any other Illinois credit unions making a conversion but the early leader was the $4.9 billion CEFCU of Peoria, which switched years ago. The “F” in CEFCU was rebranded to “First.”
“Our problem is that under a federal charter we are simply boxed in here,” Holshouser said.
Complete your profile to continue reading and get FREE access to CUTimes.com, part of your ALM digital membership.
Your access to unlimited CUTimes.com content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:
- Breaking credit union news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
- Weekly Shared Accounts podcast featuring exclusive interviews with industry leaders
- Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
- Critical coverage of the commercial real estate and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, GlobeSt.com and ThinkAdvisor.com
Already have an account? Sign In Now
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
