The economic basis of credit unions - finances of a household. The main objective of the credit union - to ensure financial stability of a household, to ensure the priority of their shareholders' financial interests. Like the credit cooperatives, credit unions form associations of a higher level, which are called corporate credit unions. Credit unions encourage savings of citizens, setting compensation payments (interest) on savings and provide from these savings loans to their members. Typically new members of the credit union become citizens having suretyship or recommendations from their friends - members of the credit union. As of the January 1, 2012 the national associations and confederations unite more than 196 million members participating in the 51,013 credit unions in 100 countries. In the credit union compensation for use of the loan (interest) is a source of compensation for savings. Until the mid-XX century, credit unions in the United States had little assets that did not exceed, as a rule, 100 thousand dollars