Two Upstate N.Y. Credit Unions to Merge
Countryside FCU members approve the credit union's acquisition by Northern CU.
Northern Credit Union of Watertown, N.Y., said it plans to acquire Countryside Federal Credit Union of East Syracuse by September, creating a credit union with more than $600 million in assets.
The Upstate New York credit unions announced Friday that members of Countryside ($161.9 million, 4,721 members) have voted to approve the merger with Northern ($447.1 million, 36,966 members).
“We are very excited by the support from Countryside membership,” Countryside CEO/President Ben Gasser said. “We know two successful credit unions will be stronger together.”
The merger and state conversion are scheduled to be completed by Sept. 1, and full integration by September 2023. Dan St. Hilaire, CEO/president of Northern, will lead both Northern and Countryside, which will operate as a division of Northern.
“We’re thrilled to welcome the membership and internal owners of Countryside Federal Credit Union to the Northern family,” St. Hilaire said. “We look forward to sharing the benefits banking with Northern provides and look forward to a bright future for our combined legacies.”
All locations will remain open. After the merger, the combined credit union will have a base of over 42,000 members and serve Clinton, Franklin, St. Lawrence, Jefferson, Lewis, Madison, Onondaga and Oswego counties.
Usually in mergers, the acquiring credit union has stronger financials. And usually the acquiring credit union is so much larger than the one it is taking over that there’s hardly a blip in results.
In this case, both have good financials, but Countryside’s are much stronger and the size difference is not so great.
If the merger had been completed June 30, it would have improved Northern’s ROA and net worth ratio significantly. Northern’s ROA would have been 1.08%, instead of its actual 0.93%. Its net worth ratio would have been 10.74%, instead of its actual 8.03%.
The merger will follow CFCU Community Credit Union’s acquisition this spring of CORE Credit Union of East Syracuse, which had $137.8 million in assets, 8,182 members as of March 31. CFCU had $1.5 billion in assets and 81,084 members as of June 30.