NCUA shuts down first credit union of 2022

The National Credit Union Administration has shuttered Empire Financial Federal Credit Union in New York. It’s the agency’s first liquidation of the year.

The $5.1 million-asset Empire was placed into involuntary liquidation on Friday, the NCUA said in a press release. The $4 billion-asset Jovia Federal Credit Union of Westbury, New York, has assumed Empire’s assets and member shares.

Empire served 270 members from various employer, association and faith groups in New York and New Jersey, according to NCUA call-report data. It swung from a profit of roughly $144,000 in 2020 to a loss of nearly $58,000 in 2021, call reports show.

Empire had been placed into conservatorship in May for undisclosed "unsafe and unsound practices,” the NCUA said at the time.

The NCUA closed four credit unions in 2021: Portsmouth Schools Federal Credit Union in Portsmouth, Virginia, Newspapers Federal Credit Union in Indianapolis, Defense Logistics Federal Credit Union in Dover, New Jersey, and Community Owned Federal Credit Union in Charleston, South Carolina.