Re: Credit card offers getting worse
There is a ton of consolidation in the Credit Card market right now. After the MBNA, Metris and Providian mergers are complete, the top 10 credit card issuers (US Domestic) will control over 90% of the market. With that consolidation comes less competition many times. Should be interesting to see the Bank of America/MBNA merger as there is somewhere in the range of 40% overlap.
In the UK, credit quality has been deteriorating quite rapidly over the last year which might explain why credit card companies have stopped offering these reward plans. I dont have the charge off numbers for the different trusts so it is hard to say.
A lot of the credit card companies are moving to a "premium" card structure in order to pay those rewards. That means merchants get charged a slightly higher interchange. You as the consumer will never know that though.
Card growth has slowed and is only growing at around 2-3% right now. Teasers still make money for them given that most people mess up and lose the teaser rate anyway. Also, on the zero% balance transfers, if you continue to use your card, all your payments go to paydown the zero percent balance first.
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