ATLANTA–Hard as it may be to believe, the third quarter of 2026 is upon credit unions, What will the second half of the year hold? What should CUs be considering as they prepare for strategic planning season? More than two-dozen forecasts ideas are being shared with CU Daily readers by more than two-dozen leaders representing a wide spectrum of solutions, business verticals and more.
This compilation of responses to the question, “What do you see ahead for the second half of 2026?,” was compiled for the CU Daily by the William Mills Agency. This is part one in at two-part series.
Opportunity For Debt Consolidation Loans
With over $1.25 trillion in U.S. credit card debt, debt consolidation loan demand keeps growing, and share is shifting toward lenders that originate with speed and a clean digital experience. TransUnion puts fintechs at roughly 42% of personal loan originations, up from about a third a year ago.
What separates the winners is capability: the speed, scale and underwriting to meet borrowers in the moment, whether a lender builds it or partners for it. Members need a clear path to payoff and credit unions that pair a modern lending experience with responsible underwriting can grow membership and give members a way out of debt.
-Matt Potere, CEO, Happy Money
CUs Can Compete With Megabanks’ Budget
For credit unions, 2026 is the year AI stops being a buzzword and becomes an efficiency play. Most credit unions sit on far richer member data than they can act on by hand. Predictive targeting changes that. It tells a lean marketing team exactly which members are ready for an auto loan, a certificate, or simply a check-in, before a competitor gets there first. That’s how a credit union competes with a megabank’s budget without hiring a data science team.
The real opportunity in the back half of the year isn’t more technology. It’s finally putting the data you already have to work.
-Mitch Rutledge, CEO and Co-founder of Vertice AI
The Harder Question Underneath the Tech
In mid 2026 a harder question sits underneath the issues of AI or technology in general: do CUs have a membership-growth engine at all? The real test of AI isn’t sophistication, it’s whether it builds relevance for new and existing members. In this light, AI is a new, compounding technological gap.
Credit unions have done an admirable job delivering digital experiences to their members but as hard-won as those gains were, AI raises the bar higher still. Deriving member and institutional value from AI is the top priority precisely because it’s a means to earning the next member, while serving the current one.
-Matthew Wood, Senior Director, Fintech AI, Tavant
Generational Wealth Transfer Must be a Priority
With the average credit union member now in their early 50s, generational wealth transfer needs to be a strategic priority for the movement. For many credit unions, the question is no longer whether inheritance will affect membership and deposits, but whether they are prepared before it does. Institutions that build the infrastructure to support estate transitions and engage the next generation of family members are better positioned to preserve relationships, retain member assets, and extend the cooperative mission across generations.
– Martha Underwood, Founder & CEO of Prismm
Break the Tension, and Let Staff Better Serve Members
The most important shift happening in credit unions right now isn’t a technology decision. It’s a workforce one. The conversation has been human worker vs. robotic worker. Automation threatened jobs; so, people resisted. That tension has held the industry back. The smarter future is Human, Robot, Agent: people doing the work only people should do, robots handling the repetitive, and AI agents bridging the two by reasoning, deciding, and acting across systems in real time.
Credit unions that get this right in the second half of 2026 won’t just reduce cost. they’ll free their people to better serve members.
– Todd Michaud, President & CEO of HuLoop Automation
The Next Competitive Differentiator
So far in 2026, credit unions’ top priority has been operational efficiency, but that doesn’t come from simply cutting operating expenses. The key to this and, frankly, what will become the next competitive differentiator, is delivering operational excellence to members through faster decisioning, instant support, lower costs and higher automation.
AI agents will help make that possible by working alongside employees to automate routine work, accelerate service and free staff to focus on higher-value member interactions.
-Elizabeth Osborne, Sr. Managing Director, Operations – Credit Union Solutions, Jack Henry
A Statistic That Should Keep CUs Up at Night
This is a statistic that should keep credit union execs up at night: 63% of teens leave their credit union at 18, and do not return. That is the trend defining the second half of 2026, as neobanks like Greenlight and Chime court Gen Alpha before credit unions even get in the room. What is the opportunity hiding in that number? Youth banking. Credit unions investing in youth-friendly apps, financial education, and parent controls today aren’t just engaging families, they are building a member pipeline that survives the leap into adulthood. The credit unions winning long-term are starting young, on purpose.
-Marcell King, President and COO, Nuuvia
The Most Effective Way to Put Agentic AI to Work
My mid-year prediction for credit unions: the second half is about turning members into primary relationships. Growth is concentrating in the largest CUs, and too many indirect-auto borrowers never deepen, so expect AI “growth agents” that don’t just recommend next-best products but actually open them.
Credit unions already lead banks on agentic-AI adoption; 2026 will reward those who put it to work on cross-sell and small-business onboarding, where 96% of small businesses still don’t bank with a credit union. The winners will deploy fast and prove the ROI.
-Philip Paul, CEO of Cotribute
Critical to Leverage Broader Financial Intelligence
Credit unions are navigating a period of rapid change as member expectations continue to evolve and fraud becomes increasingly sophisticated. In the second half of 2026, we expect more institutions to focus on turning data into actionable insights that support lending, payments, and member engagement strategies. As competition intensifies, success will depend on balancing digital innovation with the personalized experiences members expect.
Credit unions that can leverage broader financial intelligence to understand member needs better, reduce friction, and strengthen decision-making will be better equipped to deliver the personalized experiences members increasingly expect.
-John Gordon, CEO of ValidiFI
The Combination of Digital Banking Growth & Fraud Attacks
One of the biggest trends we’re seeing is the combination of digital banking growth and increasingly sophisticated fraud attacks. As more member interactions move online, fraudsters are leveraging automation, credential-stuffing attacks, social engineering, and AI-powered tactics to target digital channels. In the second half of 2026, credit unions will need to balance frictionless member experiences with stronger security measures.
Credit unions must move beyond traditional authentication and invest in layered fraud prevention and intelligent controls.
The institutions that succeed will deliver frictionless digital banking experiences while proactively protecting member accounts, ensuring that security enhancements strengthen member trust without adding complexity.
-Jim Stickley, CEO of Mahalo Banking
The Path Forward in Fraud Isn’t Adding Headcount
As we head into the second half of 2026, credit unions are on the front lines of a rapidly evolving fraud landscape, with AI making scams far more scalable, targeted, and difficult to detect. In fact, 72% of credit unions reported an increase in fraud events last year, creating unprecedented pressure for legacy processes and internal teams already balancing growing compliance demands and member expectations.
The path forward is not just to add headcount, but rather investing in smarter, more efficient processes and technologies that help teams respond faster, protect vulnerable members, and stay ahead of increasingly sophisticated threats.
– Sriram Natarajan, President, Quinte
Using Alternative Data and Not Just Legacy Models
Credit unions remain focused on growing membership among younger demographics, and for Gen Z and younger Millennials in particular, they tend to have different financial profiles than previous generations. More often characterized by thinner credit histories and more robust alternative payment behavior, credit unions are leveraging newer data models that provide a longer look back at credit behavior to better assess trajectory rather than just position.
Additionally, using alternative data, including income and employment information, rental history, utility payments and other consistent financial obligations, helps enable credit unions to attract new members who may have been excluded by legacy models before, without necessarily inviting additional risk.
-Alison Heller, Sales Director, Consumer Finance at Equifax
Expect New Measurements of Member Experience
Expect more credit unions to expand how they measure member experience beyond traditional loyalty metrics like NPS and satisfaction scores. Executives and boards increasingly want to understand what operational changes actually influence member behavior. Metrics like digital task completion, repeat contacts, complaint trends and resolution time can provide earlier signals of potential issues than survey scores alone.
High-performing credit unions will increasingly look to complement loyalty metrics with operational indicators that help guide action and improvement efforts.
-Rebecca Secor, Chief Experience Officer of Member Loyalty Group
