After five consecutive months of debt cutting, Americans have started piling on revolving credit at a pretty good clip. During July, consumers added $5.6 billion to revolving credit, mostly credit card debt, compared to less than $1.0 billion one-year ago. At an annualized rate, consumer revolving credit increased 9.0% during July. According to figures released yesterday by the Federal Reserve, at the end of July 2004 Americans owed $744.1 billion in revolving credit, compared to $726.1 billion for July 2003. Bank credit card debt (excluding store and gas credit cards) at the end of the second quarter was $672.1 billion, or roughly 90% of total revolving credit, according to CardData (www.carddata.com). At the end of July, Americans were $2039.9 billion in debt, excluding home mortgages.
REVOLVING CREDIT HISTORICAL ($billions)
Jul 04 Jun 04 May 04 Apr 04 Mar 04 Feb 04 Jan04
GRWTH: 9.0% -0.2 -1.0 -5.3 -2.1 -0.6 13.0
$OWED: $744.1 738.5 738.60 740.9 744.2 750.4 753.0
Dec 03 Nov 03 Oct 03 Sep03 Aug 03 Jul03 Jun03
GRWTH: 3.3% 4.9 4.1 6.8 3.4 1.4 2.7
$OWED: $734.1 743.8 740.5 730.7 729.1 726.8 726.1
Source: Federal Reserve; revised figures as of 9/08/04;
For complete historical data visit CardData (www.carddata.com)
After five consecutive months of debt cutting, Americans have started piling on revolving credit at a pretty good clip. During July, consumers added $5.6 billion to revolving credit, mostly credit card debt, compared to less than $1.0 billion one-year ago. At an annualized rate, consumer revolving credit increased 9.0% during July. According to figures released yesterday by the Federal Reserve, at the end of July 2004 Americans owed $744.1 billion in revolving credit, compared to $726.1 billion for July 2003. Bank credit card debt (excluding store and gas credit cards) at the end of the second quarter was $672.1 billion, or roughly 90% of total revolving credit, according to CardData (
