After falling a month earlier, financial institutions reported rising credit card defaults in November. Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) still leads all big banks with a 13 percent default rate, but Citigroup (NYSE: C) posted the largest rise as defaults jumped 1.5 percent to top 10 percent in November.
JP Morgan Chase (NYSE: JPM), the nation’s largest credit card issuer, saw defaults rise to 8.81 percent in November, which marks a new high for the year. However, the bank did report a small drop in delinquencies, which represent payments 30 days past due, to 4.9 percent from 4.95 percent in October.
Bank of America did post a marginal drop in defaults to 13 percent from 13.22 percent, but still easily holds the largest rate amongst its peers. However, the bank also saw a small rise in delinquencies for November to 7.69 percent from 7.59 percent.
Capital One Financial Corp. (NYSE: COF) also saw defaults and delinquencies rise, hitting 9.6 percent and 5.87 percent, respectively.
Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS) saw defaults inch up to 8.98 percent from 8.54 percent in November. However, the lender did see a small dip in delinquencies to 5.65 percent.
American Express (NYSE: AXP) bucked the trend, posting a decline in both defaults and delinquencies, being the only credit card issuer to do so in November. Defaults at American Express fell to 7.6 percent in November from 7.8 percent a month earlier, while delinquencies slipped to 3.9 percent from 4.1 percent.
It is widely viewed by analysts that credit card defaults and delinquencies track unemployment, which ticked down in November. Card defaults and delinquency rates had fallen overall the past two months before bumping up again in November.
