NEW YORK — The ability of credit card holders to pay off debt has shown sustained improvement this year, and on Monday, the top U.S. issuers of credit cards said that trend continued in October.
Statistics posted by five of the biggest card companies mainly showed fewer balances being written off as uncollectible, and fewer customers falling behind on payments. Four, including the largest, JPMorgan Chase & Co., reported their lowest levels of bad debt and late payments this year.
Bank of America and Citi bank saw rises in loans they gave up trying to collect.
At Bank of America, charge-offs rose to 10.15 percent of balances from 9.98 percent in September. That is still well below the peak rate of 13.53 percent the Charlotte, N.C., bank reported in December. Bank of America said late payments dipped to 5.6 percent, from 5.71 percent the month before.
Citibank, the third-largest issuer, saw charge-offs rise, to 10.27 percent from 8.99 percent in September. Citi’s charge-off rate topped out at 12.14 percent back in August 2009.
Importantly, Citi’s delinquency rate fell to its lowest point since October 2008.
