Pentagon Federal is a beast

First a little history. War Department Federal Credit Union was founded in 1935.  It changed its name to Pentagon Federal Credit Union in 1947.  It reached $1 million in assets in 1949, and 100,000 members in 1971.  It had $1 billion of assets in 1984, and $10 billion of assets in 2007.  It had 1 million members in 2010.  It had assets of $25 billion and and 1.8 million members as of July 2018 (and over 2 million as of July 2020), and is the 3rd largest credit union in the US (behind Navy Federal and SECU of NC) .  All active duty and retired members of the military are eligible to join, and since 2019 it has open membership.

In 2015, PenFed started its acquisitions spree and has since swallowed up the following credit unions:

2015: Corps of Engineers FCU of Ft Worth TX with  $41 million of assets

NAVFAC FCU of Honolulu, HI with $27 million

AAFES FCU of  Dallas, TX with $91 million

2016: Ft Gordon CU of Ft Gordon, GA with $65 million

Belvoir FCU of Woodbridge VA with $333 million

Alamo FCU of San Antonio TX with $43 million

High Plains FCU of Clovis NM with $41 million

2017: Energy FCU of Rockville, MD with $102 million

Miramar FCU of San Diego, CA with $175 million

KYANG FCU of Louisville KY with $11 million

Valor FCU of Scranton PA with $227 million

Suntide FCU of Corpus Christi TX with $71 million

Augusta Metro FCU of Augusta GA with $114 million

2019: Progressive Credit Union of New York City with $382 million

McGraw-Hill FCU of East Windsor NJ with $426 million

Source: http://creditunionwatch.blogspot.com/2017/03/penfed-on-merger-spree.html

Most of these passed unnoticed, but the merger with Progressive CU was criticized by the American Bankers Association because Progressive CU had an open charter which allowed anyone nationwide to join, and PenFed kept this policy.  The ABA complains that credit unions are subsidized and that the NCUA doesn't regulate PenFed sufficiently.

PenFed received so much criticism for this acquisition spree that it probably won't acquire any new credit unions in the future.