Big Pop in Consumer Credit, but Not From Credit Card Use

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By Jon C. Ogg Updated Published
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Credit cards

The Federal Reserve has released its report on consumer credit for the month of February. In February, consumer credit increased at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.5%. Revolving credit, effectively credit cards and merchant credit accounts, decreased at an annual rate of 3.5%. Non-revolving credit, which would include car loans and student loans, rose at an annual rate of 10%.

This puts the gain at $16.49 billion in February, while Bloomberg was calling for a gain of $14 billion.

February’s total gain may oddly have been muted due to lower spending due to weather in the month, so it will be interesting to see what the March report shows.

The drop in revolving credit was down to $854.2 billion and the non-revolving credit was up to $2.2753 trillion. That brings the total up to $3.1295 trillion among all consumer credit.

Consumer credit almost never moves the needle on the markets. Much of the data is widely known, and the average time period in a mid-month snapshot implies that this data is now a reading of five weeks to seven weeks in the past.

Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.

Photo of Jon C. Ogg
About the Author Jon C. Ogg →

Jon Ogg has been a financial news analyst since 1997. Mr. Ogg set up one of the first audio squawk box services for traders called TTN, which he sold in 2003. He has previously worked as a licensed broker to some of the top U.S. and E.U. financial institutions, managed capital, and has raised private capital at the seed and venture stage. He has lived in Copenhagen, Denmark, as well as New York and Chicago, and he now lives in Houston, Texas. Jon received a Bachelor of Business Administration in finance at University of Houston in 1992. www.247wallst.com.

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