TransUnion Reveals National Credit Card Debt on the Rise

December 17th, 2008 | Debt, News, credit cards

pen TransUnion.com, one of the three major credit bureaus, released the results of an analysis study of the trends in credit card lending specifically for the third quarter of 2008, revealing that credit card debt is on the rise. The report is one part of an ongoing series of quarterly consumer lending analyses that are focusing on auto loans, mortgage loans and credit card data. The statistics are posted on the TransUnion.com website.

According to TransUnion, the average bankcard borrower debt has increased nationally by 1.57 percent, from the previous quarter's $5,621 on average to $5,710. This was also a 6.0 percent rise compared to the third quarter of last year, which was $5,387. The highest state average was Alaska in terms of average bankcard debt, which rested at $7,827. Following Alaska was Nevada at $6,636, and then Tennessee at $6,568. The lowest average debt for bank cards was found in Iowa, which offered only $4,277 followed by North Dakota and West Virginia with $4,403 and $4,517 respectively. Bankcard debt is described as the total balance of bank-issued credit cards for a single, individual consumer.

The steepest increase in the average bank card debt over the previous quarter was observed in Wyoming, Delaware and Arizona where the increases were 4.96 percent, 4.12 percent and 3.12 percent respectively. Maine experienced the largest overall drop in credit card debt average, followed by North Dakota and then Alaska at -1.4 percent, -1.12 percent and 0.57 percent respectively.

As has been expected, bank card delinquency is once again on the rise, after two consecutive quarters where a decline was observed. Although financial institutions have been taking some relatively proactive measures in order to mitigate the risk in their portfolios, the continued deterioration observed in the in labor and finance markets is having an extremely negative impact on consumers' ability to repay all of their debt obligations. Consumers, then, who have high mortgage debt have o utilize the cash reserves that they have available in order to keep their houses rather than worrying about paying off other debts and credit card obligations as agreed upon.

Additionally, the third quarter of 2008 saw a significant drop in the nation's disposal income per capita, as well as a steep increase in unemployment. This only continued to put an additional burden on the consumer's ability to repay their debt on credit cards. However, the drop in energy prices in September may have helped to mitigate the increase in delinquency, simply because the diminishing demand for crude oil began to have an effect on the local gas pump.

The forecasting model put together by TransUnion suggests that there will be a flattening or a minimal increase in the fourth quarter as consumers begin to take stock of the bad economic news of recent months, curtailing their expenditures for a while, especially during the upcoming holiday season.

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