Since June 2007, assets at local credit unions have jumped 35 percent to $13.4 billion, nearly triple the 12 percent growth at banks based in the Philadelphia region, which reported total assets of $39.9 billion on June 30, an Inquirer analysis of federal banking data shows.
At the five biggest credit unions based in Philadelphia and the seven surrounding counties in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, the trend is even more pronounced.
Led by Police and Fire Federal Credit Union with $3.7 billion in assets, those institutions logged a 45 percent jump in total assets, to $8.2 billion.
Assets - mostly loans and investment securities - at the five biggest banks with headquarters in the same area climbed 18 percent, to $12.6 billion, during the three years ended June 30.
A similar, though less dramatic, disparity shows up nationally over the same period, with credit union assets up 22 percent, to $904 billion, compared with an 8 percent increase for banks, to $13.2 trillion.
Credit union executives attribute the strong performance of their industry to the absence of shareholder demands for results that fuel higher stock prices and richer dividends.
"We're a very consumer-oriented, cooperative type of company. We're not for profit, but we're for service," said Vince Market, chief financial officer of TruMark Financial credit union, of Trevose, the region's third-largest credit union, with $1.3 billion in assets.
Bankers - laboring under the conflicting pressures of politicians and the public to lend more while regulators urge extreme caution - have one main gripe about credit unions:
They do not pay federal income taxes, allowing them to offer higher rates on deposits and lower rates on loans.
