LEVERAGE Monthly Newsletter

By Craig Page, MBFS Chief Revenue Officer

Credit unions have built their reputation on trust, accessibility, and a strong commitment to the communities they serve. As member needs evolve, credit unions have an opportunity to expand the ways they support those communities. Business lending is a natural next step, allowing credit unions to deepen existing relationships while also creating new opportunities for sustainable growth.

The Growing Appeal of Business Lending
Many credit unions already serve small business owners, entrepreneurs, and commercial real estate investors. Expanding into business lending allows them to deepen those relationships while supporting additional member needs.

Commercial lending can diversify revenue and loan portfolios, strengthen deposits through business accounts, and improve competitive positioning. By offering both personal and business financial services, credit unions can retain existing members as their businesses and financing needs grow.

Understanding the Challenges
Commercial lending requires specialized expertise, disciplined underwriting, and infrastructure beyond traditional consumer lending. Credit unions must manage more complex financial analysis, loan structuring, documentation, and portfolio oversight while maintaining strong member service.

Building these capabilities internally can require significant investments in experienced staff, technology, and operational support.

Building a Strong Business Lending Program
A strong business lending program starts with a clear strategy based on market demand, internal resources, and risk tolerance. Credit unions also need the right infrastructure, including defined credit policies, underwriting standards, documentation processes, servicing, and portfolio management.

Experienced commercial lending expertise is equally important. Whether that talent is built internally or accessed through a CUSO, it helps credit unions manage complexity, maintain consistency, and identify the right opportunities. Staff education can further support growth by helping employees recognize business needs and connect members with the appropriate lending resources.

How CUSO Collaboration Can Help
CUSOs give credit unions a practical way to expand commercial lending capabilities without building every function internally. Through shared expertise, resources, and experienced relationship managers, credit unions can increase lending capacity while maintaining control of the member relationship.

Partnering with an experienced CUSO like MBFS can also improve efficiency and accelerate speed to market. Credit unions gain access to proven processes and specialized support while building a business lending program that aligns with their goals, resources, and risk appetite.

Turning Business Lending Into a Long-Term Growth Strategy
Business lending is becoming an increasingly important opportunity for credit unions seeking to serve more of their members’ financial needs. Success, however, requires the right strategy, expertise, infrastructure, and ongoing support.

MBFS helps credit unions build and expand business lending programs with scalable support tailored to their needs. From relationship management and credit analysis to loan documentation, portfolio management, consulting, and education, MBFS gives credit unions access to commercial lending expertise.

Ready to explore what business lending could look like for your credit union?

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Commercial deposits are one of the most underdeveloped growth opportunities for credit unions. Businesses aren't just looking for a place to park their money, they need tools to manage cash flow, move funds, collect payments, and protect their accounts. Credit unions that can't offer those tools are losing commercial relationships to banks before the conversation even starts.

Tru Treasury, the credit union industry's first and only treasury-focused CUSO, closes that gap. We provide the expertise, technology, and support credit unions need to build and run a treasury management program, so you can compete for larger commercial relationships without building every capability in-house.

Proof: A Program Still in Development Won a $9M Relationship
One credit union working with Tru Treasury was able to include treasury services in a competitive RFP, while its program was still being built. That capability alone helped it win a new business relationship worth approximately $9 million in deposits, against competitors that likely had treasury offerings already in place.

That's the real opportunity: having the right treasury partner can open doors before your program is even fully live.

Deposits and Noninterest Income, Together
A treasury program doesn't just bring in deposits; it makes them stickier. Account analysis, transaction activity, and service fees generate sustainable noninterest income, while day-to-day usage integrates your credit union into the business member's operations. That depth of relationship tends to open doors elsewhere too - lending, payments, and other services follow naturally once a business relies on you for treasury.

What It Takes to Build the Program Right
A treasury program is more than a product on a service menu. It needs strategy, sound processes, risk controls, trained staff, and reliable support behind it. Tru Treasury handles all of it, program development, technology, training, sales, onboarding, and ongoing servicing, so your team can compete for valuable business relationships without the multi-year build-out.

See What's Possible for Your Credit Union
If a program still in development helped one credit union land a $9 million relationship, imagine what a fully built-out treasury program could do in your market.

Schedule a conversation with our Consultants to see what a treasury management program could look like at your credit union!

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Every credit union wants to attract more members, especially younger ones. Few products offer a better opportunity to begin those relationships than education loans.

SoFi, a digital financial services company that began in student lending, recognized this opportunity in 2011. A group of Stanford graduates pooled $2 million to fund loans for fellow alumni. Fifteen years later, SoFi has grown into a $38 billion deposit powerhouse serving 13.6 million members.

Student lending was not simply another product. It became the gateway to additional accounts, future loans and long-term financial relationships.

According to new research from LendKey, 85% of SoFi members who began with a student loan or student loan refinance later opened additional products. Even more concerning for credit unions, nearly 25% of the deposits SoFi has drawn from other financial institutions reportedly came directly from credit unions.

The timing could not be more critical. Beginning in July 2026, new federal student borrowing limits and the elimination of the Grad PLUS program will create significant funding gaps. Many graduate and professional students—as well as families that previously relied on federal borrowing—will need to explore private education loans.

Credit unions are well positioned to meet this need. They already possess something fintech lenders have spent years and millions of dollars trying to build: trust. What many lack is the technology and infrastructure required to deliver the seamless digital lending experience today’s borrowers expect.

That is where LendKey can help.

Through its partnership with LEVERAGE, LendKey offers turnkey private student loan and student loan refinancing solutions that help credit unions reach new borrowers, deploy capital, and build relationships with younger members. Private student loans can place a credit union at the beginning of a member’s financial journey, while refinancing and consolidation can create connections with graduates and professionals entering their prime borrowing years.

An education loan should not be viewed as a single transaction. It can be the first step in a relationship that eventually includes checking and savings accounts, credit cards, auto financing, a first mortgage and decades of future financial milestones.

The next generation of members is preparing to search for new education financing options. With LendKey, credit unions can be ready to meet them at that critical first borrowing decision and potentially earn their loyalty for years to come.

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TruStage has established a clean, isolated technology environment that is fully separate from any systems impacted, potentially impacted, or still under investigation following the July 11 cybersecurity incident. This secure environment provides an important foundation for the organization’s ongoing restoration efforts.

TruStage notes that partners can continue to safely access their communications and use links shared through the company’s established channels. TruStage is working to restore systems and processes in a phased, secure, and deliberate manner while continuing to collaborate with an expert cybersecurity partner on recovery and investigative efforts.

For the latest updates and information, credit unions can visit the TruStage cybersecurity incident resource hub.

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