Historically, credit unions were preceded by widespread development of credit cooperation in many countries of Europe and America. Credit union services are available only to its shareholders. In the UK, credit unions are a source of financing of people groups. This tool is not widely used. Standards by which credit unions build their work do not coincide with the standards and regulations of consumer cooperation of the usual type. 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.