ALEXANDRIA, Va.–NCUA is now soliciting bids for its entire taxi medallion loan portfolio, which includes approximately 3,500 medallions from New York City and Chicago.
NCUA came to own the medallions following the liquidation of a half-dozen taxi medallion-lending credit unions that failed at a cost of nearly three-quarters-of-a-billion-dollars to the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund.
Worth in some cases well into seven figures, the medallions have plunged in value as the result of ride-sharing services and from being overly aggressively marketed, according to some critics.
The NCUA wants any interested bidder to take on all the loans, not just those for the New York medallions, according to Crain’s New York, which was first to report the medallion portfolio was for sale.
As CUToday.info reported earlier, NCUA has taken control of an estimated $1.5-billion in taxi medallion loans from the failed credit unions, which included Montauk CU, Melrose CU and Lomto CU.
Union Is Seeking Workout Deal
“Advocates and elected officials in New York have been pressuring the regulator to work out arrangements with borrowers, many of whom are cab drivers struggling to make their payments,” reported Crain’s New York. “The drivers' supporters have been developing a plan to buy the marked-down loans through a mixture of public and private money, and make the drivers responsible only for the reduced value of the loans.”
But Bhairavi Desai, executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Union, told Crain’s his organization doesn’t want NCUA to sell the loans and instead said a “public-private partnership can get this done and bring the drivers out of lifelong debt."
The agency is seeking to complete the sale of the taxi medallion loans by the end of January, according to Crain’s New York, quoting a source that asked not to be identified because of a non-disclosure agreement.