We accept no vendor sponsorship, paid editorial placement, or advertising dressed as journalism. The Wire is currently published by The Credit Union Wire LLC (Michigan) and supported by individual readers. A nonprofit conversion and 501(c)(3) determination are planned future steps; once that path is real, options for foundations and institutional funders will be added here.
The two ways to support the work today are below. Neither gates access to the journalism. The Wire does not paywall reporting; readers fund independence, not access.
Recurring support is the most useful kind for independent journalism. It lets us plan beat coverage instead of chasing one-off campaigns. Any amount.
For readers who want to support a specific story, a specific beat, or just the existence of independent coverage. No subscription gate, no benefits to manage — just journalism that exists because you funded it.
If you work inside a credit union, a CUSO, a trade group, a regulator, a vendor, or anywhere else in the cooperative finance ecosystem and you've seen something the public should know about — send it.
Source protection is non-negotiable. We will not name you. We will not describe you in ways that identify you. We will not give documents back to subjects of reporting. We will verify everything against primary sources before publishing, so your role can be limited to pointing us at what to look for.
Encrypted intake. Signal, ProtonMail, or in-person handoff available on request. Email the publisher directly to set up a channel — even the request itself can be sent through a clean account.
josh@thecreditunionwire.com · or set up a Signal handle by request
Worth saying out loud, so it stays said.
· Editorial direction. No funder or sponsor picks stories. No funder or sponsor reviews drafts. No funder or sponsor gets a heads-up on coverage before it publishes.
· Favorable coverage. Funders and sponsors may be covered the same way anyone else in the cooperative-finance space is covered, including critically. We will note funding relationships in stories where they're relevant.
· Veto over corrections. Corrections happen on the facts, on a public log, regardless of who funded the story or who is mentioned in it.
· Quiet retraction. We do not unpublish stories at funder request. Ever.
If the work is good, the work justifies the gift. We will not trade independence for funding, including for this round.