Mixed Performance For Bank Credit Card Delinquencies In February

Credit card delinquency rate reports are trickling in on a bank-by-bank basis and a spate of recent disclosures show mixed results.

As noted in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and as reported by Seeking Alpha, Capital One Financial said its February credit card delinquency rate was 4.04 percent, which was down a few basis points from the 4.16 percent rate seen in January. The firm also said that its net charge-off rate declined, to 4.9 percent from 5.08 percent as measured month over month and ending in February.

Also showing declines, Alliance Data Systems said in its card services portfolio, February delinquency rates were 5.67 percent, as compared to 5.8 percent in January. Net charge-offs here also were down (measured as a percentage of average receivables) 6.3 percent, from 6.6 percent month over month.

Bucking the downtrend of those first two firms, JPMorgan Chase said its February delinquency rate was up 4 basis points month over month to 1.25 percent, but there was a (very slight) decline of a single basis point in net losses measured as a percentage of the total average pool balance to 2.25 percent in February from January.

Finally, Discover Financial Services said its own credit card delinquency rate was 2.49 percent, which was unchanged from January, yet filings showed that the net principal charge-off rate jumped from 3.30 percent to 3.81 percent at the latest reading.

As noted across sites including Cardtrak, as measured across the major card issuers, at the end of the year the delinquency rate overall stood at 2.4 percent, while the rate measured by that site for the top 100 banks that issue cards showed a delinquency rate of 2.5 percent.

The aforementioned data come as U.S. credit card debt was $870 billion at the end of the year, as estimated by the Federal Reserve, representing the highest tally ever. As measured quarter over quarter, the credit card balances in total were up $26 billion.