Credit Card Charge-Off Rate (Banks)

## What this measures

Credit card loans U.S. commercial banks wrote off as uncollectible in the quarter, net of recoveries, as an annualized percent of average credit card loans outstanding. Seasonally adjusted.

## Why it matters

Cards are where consumer credit losses show first and largest. The charge-off rate is the realized loss on the unsecured borrowing households lean on when budgets are tight.

## How to read it

Higher is worse. It runs well above other loan types. Read it after the card delinquency rate (fred_cc_delinquency), which leads it by a few quarters, and beside the all-loans rate (fred_coralacbs).

## What it does not say

Commercial banks only: no savings institutions, credit unions, finance companies or private credit funds. A charge-off is the bank’s decision to write a loan off, so its timing lags the borrower’s trouble and differs from bank to bank. Seasonally adjusted, annualized, and revised.

## Source

Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Charge-Off and Delinquency Rates on Loans and Leases at Commercial Banks (FRED series CORCCACBS). Palanor pulls it from the FRED API (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis) nightly. Federal Reserve Board data are in the public domain.