Phroogal's fearless leader Jason Vitug is one our era's true entrepreneurs who enjoys pushing the proverbial envelope physically and mentally. You may recall we had Jason on last year when he announced his "Road to Financial Wellness" tour, which essentially consisted of a nationwide 30-stops-in-30-days road trip spreading the good word of credit unions and sound financial wellness practices.

The trip and experience were such a success (more than 10 million Twitter impressions, 100,000+ Facebook engagements, etc.) that Jason is upping the ante this summer with a bigger, better, and more epic nationwide adventure: another "Road to Financial Wellness" tour. This time Jason and his credit union road warrior crew will conduct 50 events in 50 states this summer.

Jason will take lessons he learned from his first expedition and apply them to this trip for a better, more enriching experience and impactful experience that will really make the credit union and financial wellness message stick -- and spread. The 2016 Road to Financial Wellness tour commences June 1 and ends in September in my home town of San Diego, where we will have a "live" report on this year's cross-country tour.

To get involved, contact Jason at sponsor@phroogal.com and/or phroogal.com/road.

We've all be inundated by the term "the cloud" for years now, but does anyone (besides your IT person) really know what the cloud is? We asked that same question to CUProdigy's CTO Xerex Bueno (also Top 10 coolest names to appear on CUbroadcast) and he said you'll probably get 10 different answers from 10 different people.

Being a Chief Technology Officer, Xerex had the answer for us and much more in this tech chat on where credit unions should be headed this year and beyond. We discussed such items as why credit unions should consider the cloud, how it benefits them and ultimately their members, security concerns, data migration, and advice for CUs venturing down this virtual road.

We also touched on his recent white paper: "Cracking the Cloud: Security, Availability, & Focus" for folks to review if they want get more details on this topic. Check it out and let us know what you think.

Each year top organizations worldwide set their goals and priorities to meet or exceed over the next 12 months. One needs to have a plan to succeed these days. And NAFCU, being no different, has set its priorities for 2016 to continue its concerted efforts in advancing the credit union movement -- especially on Capitol Hill.

To discuss its dozen priorities for this year, we invited NAFCU's Executive Vice President of Government Affairs and General Counsel Carrie Hunt on the show. We couldn't review all the goals, so here is what we reviewed in detail...

• Preserve the tax exemption (new twist here)
• Push for more regulatory relief
• Dodd-Frank
• Data security
• NCUA's FOM adjustments

We also touched on MBL and payments, as well. Check it out when you get a chance and let us know your thoughts.

We've been hearing a lot of talk the last couple years how credit unions have been growing by leaps and bounds. Word has it, however, that it's only the larger credit unions that are growing -- not the smaller ones. To get the real story on this issue, we invited NCUA's Director, Office of Small Credit Unions Bill Myers on the show to share his numbers.

We also discussed other issues smaller credit unions are facing on daily basis that are making business challenging, as wells as what larger credit unions can do to help out and how he sees this group faring in 2016. Bill not only shows us how smaller credit unions can survive, but they can thrive this year. Let us know your thoughts. Enjoy!

Ahh, it's that time of year when prediction stories are in abundance and we here at CUbroadcast would be remiss if we didn't publish our share. So to help us fill this bill, Mitek's VP of Product Sarah Clark joined us to provide four mobile predictions for 2016.

Here are the four predictions we discussed in detail and what they mean for credit unions and their members this year:

1. Mobile wins the account opening race
2. Biometrics become the norm
3. Smart phones get smarter than people when it comes to fraud
4. Real applicants get the respect they deserve in the mobile channel

Let us know your take on these predictions and feel free to provide a few of your own, as well. Enjoy!