Street Talk: Newly Merged Credit Union Sits on the “Launchpad” of Future Innovation

September 9, 2026

By Tim Zawacki, S&P Global Market Intelligence

“Street Talk”, a podcast hosted by GoWest Solutions partner S&P Global Market Intelligence, takes a deep dive into issues facing financial institutions and the investment community.

Seven months into the largest merger of U.S. credit unions on record, First Tech Federal Credit Union President and CEO Shruti Miyashiro is focused on both the short-term intricacies of bringing together two bi-coastal institutions and the longer-term evolution of the business of banking.

The Jan. 1 combination of First Tech, a San Jose-based credit union with a branch network focused on California’s Silicon Valley and Oregon’s Willamette Valley, with Digital Credit Union, a Marlborough, Mass.-based institution with a significant presence along Boston’s Route 128 technology corridor, unites institutions with many similarities in their member compositions but the logistical and cultural complexities of bringing together entities headquartered some 3,100 miles apart. The process has been expedited, Miyashiro said, given that the two institutions resembled “fraternal twins” in several key respects despite their decidedly distinct geographic footprints.

Miyashiro said in a recent “Street Talk” podcast episode that work of integrating two institutions of First Tech’s and Digital’s size and scope will amount to “the hardest” thing that many of the credit union’s employees will need to do in their professional careers. But at the same time, that work is necessary to fulfill the merger’s promise — something that First Tech and Digital characterized upon announcing the transaction in September 2024 — as a “launchpad” for future expansion.

With $27.88 billion in total assets as of June 30, First Tech ranked as the sixth-largest US credit union, behind only Navy Federal Credit Union, Raleigh, NC-based State Employees CU, Tustin, Calif.-based SchoolsFirst FCU, Boeing Employees Credit Union and Pentagon Federal Credit Union. Although Miyashiro said that integration remains First Tech’s current focus, she did not rule out future expansion taking a variety of forms.

“Job one is integration for us, period,” she said. “I’ve always been a CEO who has led with an organic growth strategy and delivered on that. … But once we have continued to deliver on our organic growth model, we get to be very selective. And we don’t have to rely on M&A for continued growth. We’ll grow organically, and we’ll bolt on where it makes sense strategically, but it won’t be a necessity for our future growth.”

The deal comes with the banking industry at a crossroads as consumers increasingly adopt new means of paying, saving and borrowing. Miyashiro said she believes diversity in the US banking system is a key differentiator relative to the models in use in other markets.

“When we look at other nations that have become so consolidated to the point that there are maybe only five real financial institutions in the whole nation, that really creates a different experience for consumers and small businesses in particular,” she said. “This idea of choice is important. This idea of even at $30 billion, approaching $30 billion in our case, it’s nowhere near the largest financial institutions in our nation. So that scale is relative.”

Miyashiro also commented on criticism about the federal tax-exempt status enjoyed by credit unions, emphasizing the importance of having a wide range of financial institutions at the community and regional levels. She also discussed her views on the future of banking and the role she envisions First Tech playing within it.

“You look back at history and … effortless banking has very much been a part of who we are for decades, way before digital even became as common as it is today,” she said. Miyashiro later added, “our investments are very much around this idea of user experience, less so around just digital by itself, but it’s the end goal of digital to make things quicker and faster as defined by the user.”

This dynamic does not represent new ground for First Tech. Miyashiro noted that both of the merged institutions have a membership base reliant on digital delivery with approximately one-half of DCU’s base of members having come to the credit union from outside of its physical footprint.

“We won’t have the highest number of branches, that’s not our future delivery model,” she said. “Our future delivery model is to understand and continue to serve the geographies and physical footprints where we are but also expand the digital delivery that we have been doing with both institutions and continue to do.”

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This article was published by S&P Global Market Intelligence and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.

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