FiNETIK – Asia and Latin America – Market News Network

Credit card issuers have had to resort to extreme measures to keep their businesses alive as US consumers buckle under the weight of the recession. Record credit card losses are pushing big US banks to come to the rescue of off-balance sheet vehicles they use to transform hundreds of billions of dollars in consumer loans into securities sold to investors.

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The support provided by Citigroup, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and American Express underscores how the deteriorating health of the US consumer is opening new fronts in the financial crisis.

Losses on US credit cards as measured by Moody’s Credit Card Index rose beyond 10 per cent of total loans outstanding in May, a new high in the 20-year history of the index and the sixth consecutive monthly record.
Most credit card loans are placed into pools – structured as trusts – that are used to back bonds sold to investors. Banks rely on such “securitisations” to fund their huge levels of credit card lending while keeping most of the risk off their books.

Although they are not obligated to support the pools of credit card receivables when losses mount, banks have done so to ensure investors continue to buy such securities.

The doomsday scenario facing banks is that credit card losses will rise to levels that force the vehicles to repay bondholders early.

Banks have been supporting card trusts by issuing – and then buying – bonds that would absorb the first layer of losses in the underlying loans. This is designed to provide a protective buffer for existing bondholders.

BofA bought $8.5bn of junior debt from one of its trusts in the first quarter and put aside $750m to cover losses on the investment.

Citi bought $265m of so-called junior debt from one of its credit card trusts in October and an additional $2.3bn of junior debt from the same trust in April, according to a regulatory filing. JPMorgan and Amex also have issued new junior debt for their credit card trusts.

In addition, JPMorgan has supported credit card bonds issued by Washington Mutual – the troubled lender bought by JPMorgan last year – by substituting its own credit card loans for WaMu’s lower quality ones.

The loss rate on the WaMu pool was 14.8 per cent in October. By comparison, a JPMorgan credit-card pool had an 8.1 per cent loss rate in May.

Source: Financial Times, 24.06.2009 by Saskia Scholtes and Francesco Guerrera in New York