Capital One Sees Surge In Charge Offs http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7014808132 April 16, 2009 9:13 a.m. EST Linda Young - AHN Editor Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Capital One has experienced a surge in charge offs as credit customers in the U.S. default on credit card debt they can't pay. The number of Capital One customers unlikely to pay surged to 9.93 percent in the U.S. in March compared to an 8.67 percent charge off rate internationally. Financial experts say that the growing U.S. unemployment rate is of concern. Historically, rising credit card charge offs have lagged increases in unemployment, but some think that trend might be reversing. Capital One (NYSE: COF) stock has lost half its value since the beginning of the year.
This shouldn't be surprising to anyone. For the past few years, Capital One has been sending credit card offers to anyone who has a pulse.
I know someone who used to have money and when he started to see he was going to go bust, he ran up over 220k on about 12 different credit cards knowing he was not going to pay it back. He used to be a mortgage broker who was doing extremely well.
I wonder how long it will be before the Credit Card Companies CEO's will be bunking up with their pal Joey Biden. They better start constructing an addition on the whitehouse sooner than later.
Chris Dodd AND Joe Biden...they have friends in high places who can't help them if their customers lose their jobs. That's the sad aspect of all of this...people who have lost their jobs or have taken a massive hit to their pay or hours are living off of credit cards, literally. Of course the default rate is going to skyrocket. There was an article about how one of the major issuers was taking 30 cents on the dollar if people would pay of their balance and cancel their account.
The bankruptcy laws are a joke. A guy like that should be castrated, then made to pay back what he owes + interest.
He will be very lucky if he isn't charged with fraud, people who do what he did in that $ amount often are. In addition debts run up in the 60 days before BK are not dischargeable if they are not shown to be for necessities.
I highly doubt it. Credit card debt is unsecured, and proving that he had the intent, beforehand, to amass large debts and not pay is a very tough standard of proof.
FWIW to anyone who thinks thats a good thing to do or may be thinking of doing the same. Its a crime to borrow money when you do not intend to pay it back or knowing that you are going to go BK so you run up your credit cards. making mistakes and or misfortune happen but stealing makes you a POS in my book.
I agree and told him as much. In fact, I told him it was akin to stealing. I don't think he cared enough to pay attention to my opinion, having just gone through the roughest patch in his life, however.