Historically, credit unions were preceded by widespread development of credit cooperation in many countries of Europe and America. The main advantage of credit unions consists in transparency, controllability, governance for shareholders. A potential new member of a credit union must submit a recommendation of shareholders in which the referee becomes a warrant of a future member 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. U.S. credit unions have another significant difference from the credit cooperatives of farmers: the first have major proportion of short-term loans, the second - long and mostly in real estate.