Members of three Saskatchewan credit unions, Conexus, Cornerstone, and Synergy credit unions, have voted to merge, effective Jan. 1, 2026.
They will form a new province-wide credit union governed by an inaugural board that will include six directors from Conexus and three each from Cornerstone and Synergy credit unions.
The three credit unions started considering a merger about a year ago, as cost increases, competitive pressures and more stringent regulation made a merger attractive, Ken Kosolofski, chair of Conexus’s board of directors, said in an interview. “If you combine all those things, we felt it was a good time for us to merge together.”
The credit unions have a combined $15 billion in assets under management, 200,000 members and 57 branches.
Voting took place both online and in-branch from June 3 to 13. The passing vote required is 75% for each credit union, between 86.5% and 88.7% of each credit union’s members voted for the merger.
The wealth management businesses of the three credit unions, including Conexus’s and Cornerstone’s Thrive Wealth Management, all use Aviso as a dealer, Celina Philpot, CEO and president of Conexus, said in an interview. “It’ll be a good transition. There’ll be a lot of common elements as we do support using a common dealer.”
The new entity will announce a new CEO and credit union name in the following months once the legal and regulatory process is complete. The CEO and credit union name will be selected from one of the three existing credit unions.
Kosolofski will be part of the inaugural board of the combined credit union, and Philpot expressed interest in becoming its CEO.
“I’ve been in the credit union system for 29 years,” Philpot said. “It would be an honour for me to take on that role, but that is yet to be determined.”