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Government Agency

National Credit Union Administration

US-NationalCreditUnionAdmin-Seal (link)
Website:

ncua.gov/
Experian Number:

440553234
Type:

Regulatory Agency
Formation:

1970
Board Chair:

Kyle S. Hauptman

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The National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) is an independent federal agency that provides insurance for deposits at federally backed credit unions, establishes and regulates federal credit unions, and provides protection to the owners of credit unions. 1

Critics have suggested that the simultaneous existence of the National Credit Union Administration and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) represents a redundancy and that they should merge into one single federal institution. 2

Background

The National Credit Union Administration is an independent federal agency that provides insurance for deposits at federally backed credit unions, establishes and regulates federal credit unions, and provides protection to the owners of credit unions. 1

The agency was created in 1970 by the U.S. Congress. 1 The National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund, which formally provides federal share insurance for deposits under $250,000, was established along with the NCUA to be managed by it. In 1979, a three-person board was created with term limits that were still in place as of March 2025. 3

As of 2025, the agency had its headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia and operated an Asset Management and Assistance Center in Austin, Texas which existed to liquidate credit unions and salvage their assets. It also had three regional offices (Western, Southern, and Eastern) that handled its supervision and examination services. 4

Activities

The National Credit Union Administration is known for endeavoring to protect the credit union system by identifying and mitigating risks to the National Credit Union Share Fund. The Share Fund, backed by the credit of the United States government, provides federal share insurance worth up to $250,000 to millions of federal credit union account holders and a vast majority of state-chartered credit unions. 4 Deposit insurance is a guarantee from the government that the money an individual has placed in a government-insured credit union or bank is safe up to the listed amount. Government institutions like the NCUA and the FDIC collect fees (insurance premiums) from the banks they back. 5 6

As a member of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council, the NCUA aims to help ensure national financial stability by articulating universal principles, forms for financial reports, and cooperating on the supervision of depository financial institutions. 4 While the NCUA encourages credit unions and its own agency staff to address supervisory disputes informally, it has also created an intra-agency body to deal with supervisory determinations when they are brought up by credit unions through appeals. The Supervisory Review Committee is made up of several senior staffers appointed by the NCUA chair, serving terms of at least two years. 7

Redundancy Controversy

Critics have suggested that the simultaneous existence of the National Credit Union Administration and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) represents a redundancy and that they should merge into one single federal institution. 2 In January 2025, the NCUA was noted as one of the federal institutions that could be targeted by the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in his effort to restructure the federal government. 8

Such a merger would be similar to the consolidation of the Bank Insurance Fund (BIF) and the Savings Association Insurance Fund (SAIF) into the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF), which occurred in 2006 following years of advocacy by figures in financial institutions like the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. 9 10

In response to these calls, president of the Defense Credit Union Council Anthony Hernandez said the NCUA must be preserved as a separate and independent institution and that the health and longevity of credit unions “and the communities they serve” depend on this. 2

Funding

The National Credit Union Administration is not funded by Congressional appropriations but by insurance assessments from its member credit unions. These collected assessments are held in the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund (NCUSIF). 11

Leadership

The National Credit Union Administration has a three-member board of directors, who determine its policies, budgets, and rules. Board members are appointed by the President and require confirmation from the U.S. Senate. The President is prohibited from choosing three members from the same political party. The president also chooses one to serve as the board chair, who is an ex-officio voting member of the government’s Financial Stability Oversight Council, which is comprised of members from various federal agencies and is assigned the task of responding to threats to the national financial system. The members serve terms of six years, and the terms are “staggered” to prevent them from ending and beginning at the same time. 4

As of March 2025, the NCUA was estimated to have 1,200 employees across 16 offices. At that time, Kyle S. Hauptman was serving as chair, with the other board members being Todd M. Harper and Tanya F. Otsuka. 12

Hauptman was named chair by President Donald Trump in January 2025. He had served as the vice chair of the NCUA since December 2020, having been appointed to the board by President Trump in June 2020 and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in December. Prior to his appointment to the NCUA, Hauptman worked as an economic policy advisor for U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) and as the staff director of the Senate Banking Committee’s Subcommittee on Economic Policy. He also served on President Trump’s transition team in 2016 and as a voting member on the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission Advisory Committee on Small and Emerging Companies. Before getting into politics, Hauptman worked as a senior vice president at the investment banking company Jefferies and Co., and at Lehman Brothers as a bond trader in New York, Tokyo, and Sydney. 13

Harper was appointed by President Trump in February 2019 and was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in March 2019. He was designated as the chair by President Joe Biden in January 2021, serving in that role until January 2025. Harper’s father had created a teachers’ credit union in the 1960s. Harper was previously the director of NCUA’s Office of Public and Congressional Affairs and, prior to that, worked as a senior legislative assistant to former U.S. Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-PA). 14

Otsuka was nominated by President Biden in September 2023 and was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in December 2023. She previously served as senior counsel for the U.S. Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee under then-Chairman Sherrod Brown (D-OH), handling banking and credit union matters. While working at the Federal Deposit Insurance Company (FDIC), Otsuka was assigned to Committee staff through the Government Affairs Institute of George University’s Capitol Hill Fellowship Program. 15

References

  1. “About.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about.
  2. “Proposals to consolidate financial regulators bring grave threats to America’s financial ecosystem and consumers’ financial stability.” Hernandez, Anthony.” CUInsight, December 16, 2024. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://www.cuinsight.com/proposals-to-consolidate-financial-regulators-bring-grave-threats-to-americas-financial-ecosystem-and-consumers-financial-stability/.
  3. “Historical Timeline.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about/historical-timeline#1970s.
  4. “Mission and Values.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about/mission-values.
  5. Lee, James; Wessel, David. “How does deposit insurance work?” Brookings, March 21, 2023. Accessed March 10, 2025. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/how-does-deposit-insurance-work/.
  6. “Understanding Deposit Insurance.” FDIC. Accessed March 10, 2025. https://www.fdic.gov/resources/deposit-insurance/understanding-deposit-insurance.
  7. “Supervisory Review Committee.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/regulation-supervision/supervisory-review-committee.
  8. Ogden, Michael. “Nussle to Musk: Keep NCUA Independent.” CUInsight, January 28, 2025. Accessed March 10, 2025. https://www.cutimes.com/2025/01/28/nussle-to-musk-keep-ncua-independent/.
  9. Deposit Insurance Fund. “Deposit Insurance Fund Merger of Bank Insurance Fund and Savings Association Insurance Fund.” FDIC, April 27, 2006. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://www.fdic.gov/news/financial-institution-letters/2006/fil06036.html.
  10. Thomson, James B. “Two Deposit Insurance Funds Are Not Necessarily Better than One.” Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, October 15, 2000. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://www.clevelandfed.org/-/media/project/clevelandfedtenant/clevelandfedsite/publications/economic-commentary/2000/ec-20001015-two-deposit-insurance-funds-are-not-necessarily-better-than-one-pdf.pdf.
  11. “Federal Deposit Insurance for Banks and Credit Unions.” Congressional Research Service, April 22, 2014. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R41718.
  12. “Leadership.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about/leadership.
  13. “The Honorable Kyle S. Hauptman.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about/leadership/honorable-kyle-s-hauptman.
  14. “The Honorable Todd M. Harper.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about/leadership/honorable-todd-m-harper.
  15. [1] “The Honorable Tanya F. Otsuka.” NCUA. Accessed March 9, 2025. https://ncua.gov/about/leadership/honorable-tanya-f-otsuka.
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