Habits are hard to break: Just when you think you're firmly in control, you backslide again. According to CardHub.com, U.S. consumers accumulated a staggering $18.4 billion in credit card debt in the second quarter -- 66% more than they accumulated in the same quarter a year ago.
Better-than-expected earnings from General Electric helped lift the Dow and S&P 500. The Nasdaq closed lower after disappointing results from chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices. Overall, the week's strong earnings bode well for coming corporate reports.
New data show that the federal government recoups at least 85% of amounts owed on defaulted student loans. The reasons why this is so explain a lot, especially about ever-rising tuition expenses at colleges across the country.
Sales agreements for previously occupied homes rose 10.4 % in October. But that one spark of hope comes against a backdrop of declining prices, bulging inventories and ongoing legal issues around foreclosures. Don't count on a real estate recovery next year.
New data from RealtyTrac shows that the real estate market is still on shaky ground. Banks repossessed 95,364 homes in August -- more than in any month since the beginning of the U.S. mortgage crisis.
For a growing number of U.S. college graduates, a diploma marks the beginning of financial difficulties. The Education Department says those who were scheduled to begin paying back their student loans in 2007 were 52% more likely to default within two years compared with those who left college two years earlier.
Approval rates for bank loans will likely fall as the number of applications increase over the next six months, according to a recent survey of banking professionals released today by Fair Isaac and Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management.
The percent of mortgages backed by the FHA that are in default has risen by a third over the last year. Many of the troubled mortgages were granted in 2007 and 2008, and mortgages typically perform worst in their second and third years.
Massive amounts of corporate debt issued from 2003 to 2007 is set to come due over the next four years. The inability of companies to refinance their debt will leave them paying high interest payments, dragging down corporate earnings and forcing some companies into bankruptcy.
As job losses mount, a growing number of consumers are falling behind on their credit-card payments. The percentage of credit-card balances that lenders have written off as uncollectable has risen, suggesting even higher levels of delinquency and charge-offs ahead in 2010.
