Credit Card Affairs Blog

Many of us feel like we've been raped by our credit companies... slashed credit limits, high APRs, rude customer service and the list just goes on and on. We fully understand the current market conditions and realize that some issuers are running out of options, but that doesn't mean that they should punish good customers.
Our friends over at Yahoo have compiled a list of credit cards that are more consumer friendly and as far as we can tell they've picked some obscure but interesting cards:

Despite a $35 annual fee, for a low rate it's tough to beat Iberia's Visa Classic cards, with a purchase rate fixed at 6.5%, compared with a national average of about 13%. Farm Bureau Bank's no-fee Platinum MasterCard currently carries a low, 5.24% variable rate.

Those rates are incredibly low. Leave a comment if you have one of these cards. Check out the link after the jump for the entire article and some more cards with reasonable rates.

The current state of the economy may worry credit card issuers, but MasterCard and Visa seem to be completely isolated from all those bad news. Both companies don't actually issue cards so they don't have to worry about consumers defaulting. Should some people stop using credit cards, MC&V would still make plenty of money thanks to the ever-growing debit card market. In fact, despite a recent $500 million anti-trust settlement, MasterCard shares shot up by nearly 10 percent yesterday.

Until recently, many economists predicted that by early next year the economy would turn a corner and start to recover. However, this is no longer the case as some fear that the worst is yet to come. So far, credit card issuers have not experienced a meltdown, but delinquencies have been rising steadily and may reach record highs next year. Some issuers expect record losses in 2009. Thanks to the $700 billion bailout we probably won't see any large credit companies fold. Let's hope for the best.

WSJ

Battered by the mortgage meltdown and a shrinking economy, credit card issuers are aggressively tightening their lending standards. But what exactly are they doing?
1. Sending out fewer card offers. Only people with very good credit are getting offers these days. Got a few blemishes on your credit - you might be out of luck.
2. Fewer 0 percent APR offers. People have been using these offers to pay off their debt, but as more and more people are defaulting it no longer makes sense for banks to offer these kind of terms.
Check out the rest of the list here

TransUnion just released their latest data on the credit market and it's looking pretty grim. Despite the economy downturn, credit card debt increased by 2.7 percent to $1,700 in the second quarter of 2008. Surprisingly, Alaskans carry higher balances than anyone else in the US. At almost $2,500, nearly double what residents of Iowa owe on their credit cards. Alaska has also seen a 4.8 percent increase from the previous quarter, topped only by Washington, DC, where residents now have 6.6 percent higher credit card balances.
I expected to see higher balance increases in 'mortage meltdown states' such as CA, FL and NV, but none of these states have seen sharp increases in credit card debt. Maybe all those people who lost their homes down here had to flee to Alaska?

For more data click here

Student debt can add up quickly over the years and paying it down can take decades. So could it possibly make sense to transfer some high-interest private student loans to your credit card to pay them off?
Maybe, but most likely not. Here's why: Credit card interest rates are usually higher than those on student loans. Yes, you might be tempted by one of those 0% APR offers, but keep in mind that those usually only last for 6-18 months. Also, there are fees associated with balance transfers that can quickly wipe out the savings you were hoping for
For more advice from an LA Times columnist click here

Another tough day out there. All major credit card companies saw their stocks slide sharply this Monday, not surprising considering all the turmoil in the financial sector. Many experts believe that credit card issuers could be hit hard by the economic slowdown as people curb their spending.
MasterCard was down 4.4 percent, Visa 3.2 percent and AMEX and Discover around 2 percent.
Source: AP

Desperate to avoid a credit card debt meltdown, banks are doing their best to keep customers afloat. What exactly the banks are doing varies. Most are trying to detect potential collection cases sooner by calling customers who have only been paying the minimum amount due. WaMu and Amex are mainly trying to work with customers and come up with payment plans, while CapOne and Citi have hired additional, more aggressive collectors.

I am very happy to see that most banks have realized that their better off giving up some of their profits to help out customers, rather than pushing everyone into bankruptcy...

To find out what Banks are using what strategy exactly click here

Source: WSJ

With technology advancing faster than ever before it should come as no surprise that many tech freaks consider credit cards to be antiquated. Barclaycard Canada just announced that they will start pushing contactless cards and plan to issue over one million cards by the end of the year. Pretty soon credit card issuers should be able to implement those chips in our cell phones, PDAs, mp3 players or whatever. Pretty cool.
Now if they only would figure out a way to make those contactless payments more secure...

Source

Yet another sign that the economy is slowing down: Consumer credit growth has slowed down dramatically. This may be bad news for many investors, but for most of us it's actually good news... After all, being the most indebted nation in the world is not something to be proud of.

Source: WSJ