Consumers might not be feeling much relief when it comes to interest rates, but the industry is stepping up its offers to grab new customers. New credit card offers are more likely to have longer interest-free periods in which purchases or transferred balances incur no finance charges.
Since the start of 2012, the average interest-free period for a new credit card rose to 10 months, up from seven in 2011. The rise in interest-free periods is attributed mostly to low interest rates for...
Home Depot partially credited recent cost-savings from interchange fees - fees banks charge retailers to process debit card transactions - for its ability to lower prices at its thousands of retail outlets.
Inserted into law as part of the Durbin Amendment, new caps on debit card processing fees are expected to save retailers as much as $5 billion per year. Previously, interchange fees were not limited by a universal maximum value. Thus, a transaction of $1,000 would cost retailers as much...
The 2012 Annual Card Issuers' Safety Scorecard from Javelin Strategy & Research found that safety for credit card users has fallen year over year - criminals find it easier to compromise important banking information. However, banks are also getting better at detecting problems when they happen, stopping fraud before it affects a user's balance.
Since 2010, credit card fraud is up 87 percent. Some of the surge in credit card fraud is attributed to the economy - fraud is big business for...
More than two-thirds of tech insiders think mobile payments will outpace credit cards as soon as 2012, according to a poll by Pew Research. The survey asked more than 1,000 people about the future for making payments with smart phones.
New technology allows for payments by phone. Known as "Near Field Communications" technology, a cell phone can quickly communicate by wireless transmission the data required to process a payment. Sixty-five percent of people surveyed believe that near field...
Fitch, one of the big three American credit ratings agencies for corporate credit accounts, reports that credit card chargeoffs are rising. Fitch's Chargeoff Index measures the number of accounts that are written off by banks.
In April, the Index increased .27% to reflect that more accounts were written off as a loss in April than in March. The total charge off rate remains at 5.44%, meaning that 5.44% of all credit cards are eventually written off by credit card issuers as unrecoverable....
A new study by the Federal Reserve indicates that the median American net worth suffered significantly through the 2007 to 2010 period. By the numbers, American family net worth fell from $126,400 in 2007 to $77,300 in 2010.
The decline isn't as pronounced as it seems. By the Federal Reserve's own admission, much of the declines in net worth can be attributed to falling housing prices. Also, 2007-2010 was one of the worst periods for stock market returns in decades.
Since 2010, the stock...
As part of the CARD Act signed into law by Congress, a new requirement put in place may make it more difficult for a minority group to access credit. Previously, credit card companies were allowed to ask for household income for applicants.
Now, after a rule change, credit card companies ask consumers about their own individual income. Without sufficient income, those who do not derive income outside the home are limited in their choices for credit cards. A stay-at-home mother who is part...
Credit card interest rates have fallen for the second week in a row to 14.92%. New credit card offers are tracked each week, with the average annual percentage rate used as an index to understand how interest rates affect credit card rates.
Credit card rates are variable. This means that the credit card rate is dependent on market interest rates, which move up and down based on a benchmark rate like the 10-year US Treasury rate of interest, or other benchmarks like LIBOR. Lower interest...
Be sure to check your mail carefully over the next month. In 2001 a new law went into effect that would require credit card companies to send annual privacy policies to cardholders. As it went into effect during the summer, the summer months happen to be the busiest for credit card privacy policies mailed to consumers.
Your privacy policy dictates how a credit card company can use your information. By law, credit card companies have to give you the right to opt out of some personal...
Not all states are created equal - the same can be said for credit card debt and credit scores. Throughout the United States, you can find an array of cultures, living conditions and standards of living that all contribute unevenly to the use and reliance on credit cards. One of the most interesting aspects of this list is the relatively low credit card debt in states that are, on average, poorer than states laden with high debts. The following states should be examined in further detail to...
Continue reading The key component of any recession is that the vast majority of the public simultaneously decide to stop spending money and instead focus on paying off debts. In the United States, this trend has been in effect primarily since October 2008, but was occurring at a slower pace since late 2006.
In the previous three and a half years, the amount of consumer credit card debt in the United States has decreased by some 30%. As a result, there is a growing number of individuals within the American...
Throughout the vast majority of the credit card industry's existence, credit card interest rates have remained fairly fluid and changed from week to week. Over the past year, that notion has changed and in the United States, the second extended period of interest rate stagnation in just the past year has manifested.
Interest rates remained unchanged this week - just as they have for the past five weeks - at 14.91%. This trend is recent and was unheard of in the decades prior to last year,...