2026 Underground IMPERATIVE Money20/20

If your team hasn't started your AI strategy, you won't be working towards efficiencies — you'll be working on merger strategies. The gap is real. It is growing. And it is hitting every corner of your credit union whether you are ready or not.

We have spent years watching AI reshape industries, waiting to see if it applies to us. It does. It already has. And the window for a measured, strategic response is closing faster than most boards want to admit.

No single credit union has the budget to out-tech a big bank. But that has never been how we win. Credit unions were built on the idea that collective action creates impact that individuals cannot — and that is exactly the advantage we have right now. The institutions that figure this out together, that share what works, build what fits, and move as a community, will do more for their members than any bank ever could.

Underground is where that work starts. No filters. No vendor theater. Just the leaders who are ready to stop watching and start building together, in the room, on the record.

This is the conversation the industry needs to have. The only IMPERATIVE is whether you are in it.