Recently announced Gold Globe nominee "Ozark" joins the ranks of "Breaking Bad," "The Big Short," "The Wolf of Wall Street," and many more crime TV and movies showing us that money-making can be a dirty business. The negative impacts on society as a whole are well documented. Increased crime drives up the cost of government due to the need for increased law enforcement. In socio-economic terms, money laundering transfers economic power from the market to criminals, and in extreme cases, can lead to a virtual take-over of legitimate government. In other words, the criminals gain such a foothold they influence, directly or indirectly, the political workings of the country. While on a large scale we all know money laundering is really bad, explaining to members why the credit union employs fraud detection and anti-money laundering tools may require some education on how AML impacts the every day, average credit union member.

The new Current Expected Credit Loss (CECL) accounting standard for banks and credit unions of all sizes is set to go into effect in 2020 for SEC registrants, and 2021 for all other banks and CUs. The new standards in credit union regulations are going to be both a blessing and a curse for many small to mid-sized credit unions. Now more than ever, CUs are sitting on mounds of data about their members and accounts, but many struggle not only finding the data from disparate sources, but also in making sense and gaining actionable insights from it. The reporting required to comply with the new standards may pose a challenge to CUs, but is also an opportunity to finally put that data to good use. Harnessing data is no longer an option for the C-Suite. These new requirements can be used as a spring board to develop a competitive advantage in credit union lending.

Staying ahead of the ever-changing credit union compliance rules and regulations is no simple feat. For credit unions big and small, compliance is identified as a top critical issue they face every day. When compliance mistakes are made, the credit union takes a hit financially, and this hit can be detrimental especially for smaller credit unions. In order to keep the lights on at your credit union, here are 4 compliance mistakes you should avoid making.

Money laundering is dirty business. One that the U.S. government has been trying to clean up since 1970. Laundering is used to hide criminal and terrorist activities by inserting "dirty" money into the legitimate financial system, "washing" it around financial institutions through transfers, until it comes out looking "clean." These ill-gotten gains can impact the global economy as much as our own. Here are some fast facts about the Anti-Money Laundering rules to help your CU take on the seedy underbelly of criminal financing. 

Think the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) isn't exciting to talk about? Think again! Here are 5 facts about OFAC that apply to credit unions and can add some zest to an otherwise heavy compliance requirement.

Some risks are easy to recognize, and the decisions you need to make to mitigate these risks are obvious. Don't invest your life savings into lottery tickets. Don't drive a car at high speeds using a spare tire. Don't jump out of an airplane without a parachute. However, the risks credit unions face are much trickier to identify, analyze, and determine acceptable outcomes. While extremely difficult and multifaceted, taking steps in the right direction of calculating and mitigating risk can help prevent fraud and ensure the financial success of your credit union. Risk analysis should not be a time-consuming burden. The right credit union compliance tools in your arsenal can automate procedures. Here are seven areas where your credit union technology should facilitate the mitigation of risk.