NCUA Credit Union Data: 5300 Call Reports, Net Worth Ratios, and Enforcement Actions

The National Credit Union Administration publishes quarterly financial data for every federally insured credit union in the United States. The 5300 Call Report, filed by more than 5,000 institutions each quarter, captures assets, deposits, loans, capital ratios, delinquency rates, charge-offs, and membership counts in a single bulk CSV download. It is the credit union equivalent of the FDIC call report—a comprehensive longitudinal record of an entire supervised sector, updated four times a year and available at no cost.

Despite covering a sector with $2.4 trillion in total assets and 135 million members, the NCUA dataset receives considerably less analytical attention than FDIC or Federal Reserve bank data. Credit unions are not publicly traded; they file no 10-K. Their capital structure and tax treatment differ from banks in ways that make direct comparison tricky. The regulatory framework—Prompt Corrective Action thresholds, net worth ratios, the corporate credit union system—is largely unknown outside the industry. This article covers the full picture: what NCUA regulates, what the data contains, how the enforcement machinery works, and how to download and analyze the quarterly call report in Python.

What NCUA regulates

The National Credit Union Administration is an independent federal agency established by the Federal Credit Union Act of 1934. Its mandate has two parts. First, it charters and supervises federal credit unions—institutions organized under the Federal Credit Union Act rather than a state charter. Second, it administers the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund, or NCUSIF, which insures member deposits (called “shares” in credit union terminology) at all federally chartered credit unions and at most state-chartered credit unions that elect federal insurance.

The NCUSIF is the direct credit union analog to the FDIC's Deposit Insurance Fund. Like the FDIC's DIF, the NCUSIF is funded by premiums paid by insured institutions and is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government. The standard insurance limit is $250,000 per member per account ownership category, identical to the FDIC limit. Unlike the FDIC, which insures commercial banks and savings associations, the NCUSIF covers only credit unions. The two funds have never been merged, and there is no mechanism for cross-subsidization.

NCUA also oversees a second tier of institutions: corporate credit unions. These are wholesale cooperatives that serve retail credit unions rather than individual members. They provide investment services, payment processing, and liquidity to the retail credit union system. Corporate credit unions were at the center of the financial crisis of 2008–2010 and remain an important structural feature of the sector.

Credit unions versus banks: structural differences that matter for the data

Credit unions are member-owned cooperatives. Every depositor is an owner; there are no external stockholders. This has several consequences for how the financial data reads.

First, credit unions are tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(14) of the Internal Revenue Code. Net income is not subject to federal income tax. This means credit union net income figures are not comparable to bank net income on a pre-tax basis—a 1% return on assets at a credit union is economically stronger than a 1% ROA at a taxable bank.

Second, membership eligibility requires a “common bond.” There are three recognized bond types: occupational (employees of a specific employer or industry), associational (members of an organization such as a trade union or church), and community (residents of a defined geographic area). Field of membership expansions require NCUA approval for federal credit unions; state-chartered credit unions follow state law. The common bond requirement historically limited scale and is one reason the sector remains fragmented relative to commercial banking.

Third, retained earnings accumulate as “undivided earnings” rather than paid out to shareholders. Capital cannot be raised from external equity markets. A credit union that needs to rebuild capital must do so entirely through retained earnings, which is why the NCUA's net worth ratio and Prompt Corrective Action framework places such emphasis on the current ratio rather than a tier-based capital stack.

Fourth, deposits are called “shares” because members technically hold a share of the cooperative. In the call report data, the line item labeled shares corresponds to total deposits in bank terminology. This nomenclature appears throughout NCUA filings and can cause confusion when joining credit union data with FDIC bank data.

Scale and fragmentation

As of year-end 2025, there are approximately 4,700 federally insured credit unions with combined assets exceeding $2.4 trillion and a combined membership of 135 million. Those aggregate figures suggest a substantial sector—but the distribution of size is dramatically skewed.

The largest credit unions—Navy Federal Credit Union (~$180B assets), Pentagon Federal Credit Union (~$40B), SchoolsFirst Federal Credit Union (~$30B)—operate at commercial bank scale with full product suites, national footprints, and sophisticated treasury functions. These institutions are outliers. The median federally insured credit union holds roughly $50 million in assets, compared to a median of $200 million or more for FDIC-insured commercial banks. Roughly half of all credit unions hold less than $50 million in total assets, and many hold less than $10 million.

This fragmentation shapes everything about the data. Small credit unions often have only a handful of employees; they lack the staff to build robust compliance functions or technology infrastructure. Their call report data can be noisy—data entry errors, restated filings, and unusual balance sheet compositions are more common than at large banks. Analysts working with the bulk call report data should filter carefully by asset size before computing sector-wide statistics, or risk having the long tail of small institutions distort aggregates.

The 5300 Call Report: what is in the data

Every federally insured credit union files the NCUA 5300 Call Report quarterly—in March, June, September, and December. The data are collected through the NCUA's Credit Union and Corporate Call Report system (CAVES) and are published as bulk CSV downloads on the NCUA website at ncua.gov/analysis/credit-union-corporate-call-report-data. The download page offers individual quarters going back to at least 2012, with annual archives available further back. Files are distributed as ZIP archives; each ZIP contains multiple delimited text files covering different sections of the call report.

Key fields in the FS220 (balance sheet and income) file include:

• CU_NUMBER. The NCUA charter number, the primary identifier for the institution. This is the join key to the NCUA's institution profile data and enforcement action records. Different from the RSSD ID used by the Federal Reserve.
• RSSD9001. The Federal Reserve RSSD identifier, present for institutions that also report to the Fed. Use this field when joining NCUA data to Federal Reserve H.8 or National Information Center data.
• CYCLE_DATE. The report date in YYYYMMDD format. For quarterly filings this is the last day of March, June, September, or December.
• ACCT_010 (total assets). Total assets in dollars. The denominator for most ratio calculations: return on assets, net worth ratio, loan-to-share ratio.
• ACCT_018 (total shares and deposits). All member deposits plus any non-member deposits. The primary funding source. Equivalent to total deposits in FDIC call report terminology.
• ACCT_025B (net loans and leases). Total loans net of the allowance for loan and lease losses. The primary earning asset category.
• ACCT_115 (net income, year-to-date). Cumulative net income from the start of the calendar year through the report date. Annualizing this figure for Q1 (multiply by 4), Q2 (by 2), and Q3 (by 4/3) produces a comparable ROA across quarters.
• ACCT_700A (net worth / undivided earnings). The numerator for the net worth ratio. Represents accumulated retained earnings since the institution's inception, net of any losses. There is no paid-in capital from external investors; this is the entire capital base.
• ACCT_900 (total members). The count of member accounts. Not directly analogous to any bank metric; membership counts drive market share analysis in specific field-of-membership geographies.
• 60-day delinquency and charge-offs. Multiple line items in the FS220D (delinquency) and FS220G (charge-off) supplement files track delinquent balances by loan category and charge-off rates. These are the primary asset-quality signals in credit union data, serving the same role as the Texas Ratio components in FDIC bank failure analysis.

The net worth ratio and Prompt Corrective Action

The central capital metric for credit unions is the net worth ratio: net worth divided by total assets. This is simpler than the tiered risk-based capital framework that applies to banks under Basel III, but the simplicity is intentional. Credit unions cannot issue external equity, so regulating the composition of the capital stack is less meaningful than ensuring the overall ratio remains adequate.

The Federal Credit Union Act and NCUA regulations at 12 CFR Part 702 define the Prompt Corrective Action framework around the net worth ratio. The thresholds are:

• Well Capitalized: 7% or higher. No mandatory regulatory restrictions. The typical operating range for a healthy credit union. Many institutions target 10% or more as a buffer against economic downturns.
• Adequately Capitalized: 6% to 7%. The institution is technically adequately capitalized but may not accept brokered deposits and faces heightened supervisory attention.
• Undercapitalized: 4% to 6%. Mandatory filing of a Net Worth Restoration Plan (NWRP). Restrictions on growth, dividends, and new activities. NCUA examinations become more frequent.
• Significantly Undercapitalized: 2% to 4%. NCUA may appoint a conservator or impose an operating agreement. The institution is likely to face merger or liquidation unless the ratio recovers.
• Critically Undercapitalized: below 2%. NCUA is required to place the institution in conservatorship within 90 days unless the Board determines there is a “less costly alternative.” Liquidation is the most common outcome.

The PCA framework differs from bank capital regulation in several important ways. Banks operate under a risk-weighted framework where capital requirements vary by asset risk category. Credit union capital is measured against total assets, not risk-weighted assets, which means a credit union with a very conservative asset mix (short-term government securities, fully collateralized auto loans) and one with a more aggressive mix (long-term mortgages, member business loans) face identical PCA thresholds. NCUA has introduced a risk-based capital rule applicable to “complex” credit unions (those above $500 million in assets), but the simple net worth ratio remains the foundational metric for most of the sector.

NCUA enforcement actions

When examination findings reveal material problems, NCUA has a graduated range of formal and informal enforcement tools. Published enforcement actions are available at ncua.gov/regulation-supervision/enforcement-actions and are updated quarterly. The taxonomy from least to most severe:

• Letter of Understanding and Agreement (LUA). An informal enforcement tool—not published in the public enforcement database. The credit union and NCUA agree in writing on remediation steps. Failure to comply can lead to formal enforcement. LUAs are the most common initial response to examination findings and are not reflected in any public data.
• Consent Order. A formal, published agreement between NCUA and the institution that specifies required corrective actions, timelines, and reporting requirements. Less adversarial than a cease and desist order because the institution negotiates and signs the order rather than having it imposed. Consent orders are the most common published enforcement action.
• Order to Cease and Desist (C&D). An order issued by NCUA's Board or Regional Director directing the institution to stop a specific unsafe or unsound practice or law violation. Can be imposed without the institution's consent. Violation of a C&D can result in civil money penalties.
• Civil Money Penalty (CMP). A fine imposed on the institution or on individual directors and officers for violations of law, regulation, or formal orders. Individual penalties can reach $1 million per day per violation for knowing violations.
• Prohibition Order. Bars an individual (typically a director, officer, or employee) from participating in the affairs of any federally insured financial institution. Issued following findings of fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, or other serious misconduct.
• Conservatorship. NCUA places the credit union under the control of a conservator—typically an NCUA employee or a management team appointed by NCUA. The conservator assumes all operational authority. Management is displaced. The conservatorship may last months or years while NCUA attempts to rehabilitate the institution, arrange a merger, or prepare for liquidation.
• Liquidation. NCUA is appointed liquidating agent and winds down the institution. Member shares (deposits) up to $250,000 per account category are paid from the NCUSIF. Remaining assets are sold to satisfy creditors. Unlike the FDIC, which nearly always seeks an acquiring institution through a Purchase and Assumption transaction, NCUA frequently liquidates failed credit unions directly, particularly small institutions where no merger partner can be found.

Credit union failures and conservatorship

The NCUA's role as receiver and liquidating agent differs structurally from the FDIC's. When a bank fails, the FDIC almost always transfers deposits to an acquiring institution through a Purchase and Assumption agreement—depositors typically experience no interruption in service. When a credit union fails, the NCUA may arrange a merger into a healthy credit union (the preferred outcome), but if no acquirer is found, it pays insured shares directly from the NCUSIF and liquidates assets. Members receive checks in the mail rather than finding their accounts seamlessly transferred.

Notable credit union failures illustrate the range of scenarios NCUA must manage. Bethex Federal Credit Union, a New York City community development credit union serving low-income members in the South Bronx, was placed into conservatorship by NCUA in 2014 following examinations that found the institution was critically undercapitalized and suffering from management and internal control failures. It was subsequently liquidated, with insured shares paid by the NCUSIF—a painful outcome for the underserved community it had served for decades.

Larger failures have been rarer. The institution-level failure of a large retail credit union is uncommon partly because the PCA framework provides early intervention mechanisms and partly because the cooperative structure tends to limit the speculative balance sheet risks that have killed commercial banks. The catastrophic failures of 2008–2010 came from a different part of the system: the corporate credit unions.

The corporate credit union crisis of 2008–2010

Corporate credit unions are wholesale institutions that serve retail credit unions, not individual members. They hold excess liquidity from retail credit unions, invest it, and provide payment processing, settlement, and correspondent services back to the retail system. In 2008, the two largest corporate credit unions—U.S. Central Federal Credit Union and WesCorp Federal Credit Union—held massive concentrations of mortgage-backed securities that lost value catastrophically during the financial crisis.

WesCorp Federal Credit Union, based in San Dimas, California, was the largest corporate credit union in the United States with approximately $34 billion in assets at the time of its collapse. It was placed into NCUA conservatorship in March 2009 along with U.S. Central Federal Credit Union, which held approximately $57 billion in assets and served other corporate credit unions as a “corporate credit union's credit union.” These were the largest credit union failures in US history. Four additional corporate credit unions were subsequently placed in conservatorship or liquidated: Constitution Corporate Federal Credit Union, Members United Corporate Federal Credit Union, Southwest Corporate Federal Credit Union, and Innovative Bank (formerly known as Cap Corp).

The resolution of the corporate credit union crisis required NCUA to borrow from the US Treasury to fund the Temporary Corporate Credit Union Stabilization Fund (TCCUSF), a resolution vehicle separate from the NCUSIF. The total cost to the credit union system was approximately $28.5 billion—recovered over roughly a decade through assessments on all federally insured credit unions. The last TCCUSF assessment was collected in 2021. NCUA subsequently merged the TCCUSF into the NCUSIF and has published detailed loss-recovery analysis documenting the final resolution cost.

The corporate credit union crisis led to fundamental restructuring of the corporate credit union system. NCUA imposed new capital requirements, investment restrictions, and concentration limits on corporate credit unions. The number of corporate credit unions shrank from roughly 28 before the crisis to fewer than 10 by the early 2020s. The two largest surviving corporate credit unions, Alloya Corporate Federal Credit Union and Catalyst Corporate Federal Credit Union, merged in 2021 to form one dominant wholesale institution.

The consolidation trend: from 12,000 to 4,700

Credit union consolidation has been one of the defining trends in the sector for four decades. In 1980, there were approximately 12,000 federally insured credit unions. By 2025, that number has fallen to roughly 4,700—a decline of more than 60% over 45 years, averaging about 150 to 200 disappearances per year. Unlike the bank failure waves of the 1980s and 2008–2012, most credit union disappearances are voluntary mergers rather than failures. NCUA data distinguish between “liquidations” (failures) and “mergers” in the quarterly call report, and mergers vastly outnumber failures in every recent period.

Mergers require NCUA approval. A credit union seeking to merge into another files an application with its regional NCUA office. NCUA evaluates the financial strength of both parties, the compatibility of their fields of membership, the continuity of service to members, and the adequacy of disclosures to members who must vote on the merger. For federally chartered credit unions, member approval by majority vote is required. NCUA has the authority to reject mergers that would create an unsafe or unsound combined institution or that would harm member interests.

The drivers of consolidation are structural. Small credit unions face the same technology and compliance cost pressures as small community banks, but without the capital markets access or scale economies that allow larger institutions to absorb those costs. A credit union with $10 million in assets cannot afford a full-time compliance officer, a modern digital banking platform, and the cybersecurity infrastructure that regulators and members now expect. Fintech competition has accelerated this pressure: digital-first financial services providers offer checking accounts, consumer loans, and payment products without field-of-membership restrictions, at lower cost, with better mobile experiences than most small credit unions can provide.

The result is a sector that is shrinking in institution count while growing in aggregate assets. The remaining credit unions are larger on average than their predecessors. Whether the surviving institutions will be able to compete with large banks and fintech platforms at scale, or whether the sector will continue to consolidate until only a handful of large national credit unions remain, is an open question in the industry.

Downloading and analyzing the 5300 data

The NCUA publishes the quarterly bulk download at ncua.gov/analysis/credit-union-corporate-call-report-data. Each quarter's ZIP archive contains multiple delimited text files. The most important for financial analysis is FS220.txt, which contains the balance sheet and income statement. Supplement files cover delinquency (FS220D), charge-offs (FS220G), investments, interest rates, and other specialized schedules. The main file typically contains one row per institution per quarter, with over 200 columns. Column names follow the NCUA's account code scheme: ACCT_010 for total assets, ACCT_018 for total shares, and so on. The data dictionary is published separately and is essential reading before working with the raw files.

The following Python snippet downloads the most recent quarter's 5300 data, computes the distribution of net worth ratios across all federally insured credit unions, and flags institutions below the 7% Well Capitalized threshold.

import requests
import zipfile
import io
import pandas as pd

# NCUA publishes quarterly 5300 call report data as ZIP archives.
# The URL pattern is: https://ncua.gov/files/analysis/call-report-data/{YEAR}/CALL{YYYYQQ}.zip
# where QQ is the quarter number (03, 06, 09, 12 for Q1-Q4).
# Most recent completed quarter: 2025 Q4

NCUA_ZIP_URL = (
    'https://ncua.gov/files/analysis/call-report-data/2025/CALL2025012.zip'
)

resp = requests.get(NCUA_ZIP_URL, timeout=120)
resp.raise_for_status()

with zipfile.ZipFile(io.BytesIO(resp.content)) as z:
    # The main financial data file is FS220.txt (balance sheet / income)
    with z.open('FS220.txt') as f:
        df = pd.read_csv(f, sep=',', low_memory=False)

# Key columns (NCUA uses uppercase field names in 5300 exports)
# RSSD9001 = RSSD ID (Federal Reserve routing identifier)
# CU_NUMBER = NCUA charter number
# CYCLE_DATE = report date (YYYYMMDD)
# ACCT_010 = total assets (dollars)
# ACCT_018 = total shares and deposits
# ACCT_025B = total loans and leases (net)
# ACCT_115 = net income year-to-date
# ACCT_900 = total members
# ACCT_700A = net worth (retained earnings / undivided earnings)

# Compute net worth ratio: net worth / total assets
df['net_worth_ratio'] = df['ACCT_700A'] / df['ACCT_010'].replace(0, float('nan'))

# PCA thresholds per 12 CFR Part 702
def pca_bucket(r):
    if pd.isna(r):
        return 'Unknown'
    if r >= 0.10:
        return 'Well Capitalized (>=10%)'
    if r >= 0.07:
        return 'Well Capitalized (7-10%)'
    if r >= 0.06:
        return 'Adequately Capitalized (6-7%)'
    if r >= 0.04:
        return 'Undercapitalized (4-6%)'
    if r >= 0.02:
        return 'Significantly Undercapitalized (2-4%)'
    return 'Critically Undercapitalized (<2%)'

df['pca_status'] = df['net_worth_ratio'].apply(pca_bucket)

# Distribution of net worth ratios
print("Net worth ratio distribution (all federally insured CUs):")
print(df['pca_status'].value_counts().to_string())
print()

# Flag credit unions below 7% (below Well Capitalized threshold)
below_well_cap = df[df['net_worth_ratio'] < 0.07].copy()
below_well_cap = below_well_cap.sort_values('net_worth_ratio')

print(f"Credit unions below 7% net worth ratio: {len(below_well_cap)}")
print()
print("Bottom 20 by net worth ratio:")
cols = ['CU_NUMBER', 'ACCT_010', 'net_worth_ratio', 'pca_status']
print(
    below_well_cap[cols]
    .head(20)
    .rename(columns={
        'CU_NUMBER': 'Charter',
        'ACCT_010': 'Total Assets ($)',
        'net_worth_ratio': 'NW Ratio',
        'pca_status': 'PCA Status',
    })
    .to_string(index=False)
)

# Return on assets (annualized from YTD net income)
# Assumes Q4 data; divide by 2 for Q2, 4/3 for Q3, 4 for Q1
df['roa'] = df['ACCT_115'] / df['ACCT_010'].replace(0, float('nan'))

print()
print("Median ROA by PCA bucket:")
print(df.groupby('pca_status')['roa'].median().to_string())

A few practical notes for working with this data. The ZIP file is large—typically 30–80 MB depending on the quarter—so set an appropriate timeout on the requests call. The CSV files inside the ZIP use comma delimiters and include a header row; most columns are numeric. Missing values appear as empty strings in the raw CSV, which pandas will read as NaN if low_memory=False is set. The RSSD9001 field is populated for only a subset of institutions—use CU_NUMBER as the primary join key within the NCUA dataset, and use RSSD9001 only when joining to Federal Reserve data sources.

For longitudinal analysis, download multiple quarters and concatenate on CYCLE_DATE and CU_NUMBER. Institutions that merge or are liquidated will disappear from the dataset in the quarter following their resolution; tracking their last observed net worth ratio against the resolution outcome requires joining the financial data to the NCUA's institution history file, which records merger dates, liquidation dates, and successor institution charter numbers.

Connecting to other federal financial datasets

The NCUA 5300 data is most useful when analyzed alongside other federal financial datasets. Several integration points are worth noting.

The FDIC call report data covers commercial banks and savings associations—the direct competitors of credit unions for consumer deposits and retail lending. The FDIC Statistics on Depository Institutions (SDI) database provides the same quarterly financial metrics for FDIC-insured institutions that the NCUA 5300 provides for credit unions. Analysts comparing the two sectors should account for the tax-exempt status of credit unions when comparing ROA or net income figures, and should note that FDIC “deposits” map to NCUA “shares.”

The OCC publishes enforcement actions against national banks and federal savings associations on a schedule similar to NCUA's enforcement publication. Comparing enforcement action rates between the OCC's nationally chartered bank population and NCUA's credit union population requires normalizing by institution count and asset size, since the populations differ dramatically in scale distribution.

The Federal Reserve's H.8 statistical release, “Assets and Liabilities of Commercial Banks in the United States,” provides aggregate weekly balance sheet data for the commercial banking system. It does not cover credit unions. For a consolidated view of depository institution balance sheets that includes credit unions, the Federal Reserve's Financial Accounts of the United States (Z.1 release) is the authoritative source; it breaks out credit union assets, liabilities, and net worth in the household and nonprofit sector accounts.

FINRA BrokerCheck is relevant for credit unions that operate securities-registered subsidiaries or that have registered investment adviser relationships. Some large credit unions offer brokerage services through affiliated CUSOs (Credit Union Service Organizations); the employees and the CUSO itself may appear in FINRA's registration data even though the parent credit union is supervised by NCUA rather than FINRA or the SEC.

Related writing

FDIC Bank Failure Data: Every US Bank That Has Failed Since 1934— the complete FDIC failure list and call report schema, Texas Ratio failure prediction, and Python download recipes for the credit union sector's commercial bank counterpart.

OCC Bank Enforcement Actions: Formal Agreements, Cease and Desist Orders, and Civil Money Penalties Against National Banks— how the OCC's enforcement taxonomy compares to NCUA's, and how to parse the OCC enforcement database in Python.

FINRA BrokerCheck: The Public Database of Every Registered Broker and Investment Adviser— how to query BrokerCheck for the securities-registered affiliates and CUSO subsidiaries that appear alongside credit union supervision records.