U.S. credit card charge-off rates that began rising in the fall of 2008 likely hit their peak during the first quarter of this year and are beginning a march back to lower levels, Moody’s Investors Service announced today.

Default rates for first and second mortgages and auto loans reportedly declined in April, from March, though bank card default rates rose for the third month in a row, according to the latest data from Standard & Poor's Ratings Services and Experian PLC.

Target Corp.’s first-quarter performance exceeded the company’s expectations, including its credit card segment’s rise in profitability.

U.S. consumer credit scores are holding steady, with the average score reaching 670 in April, up one point since the beginning of the year, according to new data from Credit Karma Inc.

Determined to improve earnings on sales of bad debt, many credit issuers and consumer lenders are holding back the amount of chargeoffs placed for sale. The strategy is working as prices have inched up since late 2009.

Americans unexpectedly increased borrowing in March, but their credit-card use fell an 18th straight month as unemployment remained high, according to a Dow Jones report.

Portfolio Recovery Associates Inc., a Norfolk, Va. debt buyer, reported a quarterly profit above Wall Street expectations as cash collections rose 33%. The company attributed the gain to a shift in its collection mix to bankrupt accounts, and seasonal strength in the quarter.

Benefiting from an overall improved global economy, American Express Co. reported a 102.5% increase in net income for the first quarter ended March 31, more than double what it earned a year earlier.

The credit card charge-off rate rose again in March, reaching a point that is “at or near a peak,” Moody’s Investors Service said in a report this week.

Citing the continued effects of the economic downturn, Wells Fargo & Co. today reported a higher credit card charge-off rate on a slightly smaller pool of credit card receivables for the first quarter ended March 31 compared with the same period last year.

U.S. Bancorp yesterday reported credit and debit card revenue of $258 million for the first quarter ended March 31, up 0.8% from $256 million during the same period last year.

Aided by a substantial release of its credit card loan-loss reserves, Bank of America Corp. on Friday announced that its Global Card Services unit earned $952 million in net income during the first quarter ended March 31; the unit reported a $1.75 billion loss during the same period a year ago.

Early-stage delinquencies ticked up at a handful of credit card issuers in March, possibly a bad sign for future credit trends.

Citing modest improvements in its recession-battered card portfolio, JPMorgan Chase & Co. this week reported a $303 million loss within its Card Services unit for the first quarter ended March 31; it reported a $547 million net loss during the same period last year.

Total credit lines among the top five U.S. credit card issuers soared 56.5% to a peak of $3.74 trillion in 2007 from an aggregate $2.39 trillion in 2005 following the rise of home prices during the first half of the decade. But as the bubble burst in 2007 and housing values began to decline, followed by two years of recession, credit card customers defaulted on their accounts en masse, PaymentsSource data show.

Consumer credit card debt held steady in the first quarter with U.S. consumers paying down card debt by less than 1%, according to a report released today by Credit Karma Inc.

The FBI last week announced the arrest of eight men, charged with fraudulently using other consumers' credit card information to buy as much as a million dollars in merchandise from stores in Northeast Ohio - including Home Depot, Staples, Best Buy, Lowe's, Macy's, Nordstrom, Saks Fifth Avenue, hhgregg and Sears.

The charge-off rate on U.S. credit cards declined last month, along with the rate of card accounts past due, according to a March 26 report from Fitch Group’s Fitch Ratings Inc.

One of the new credit card law's lesser-known provisions is funneling distressed borrowers to credit counselors, an industry once tarred as predatory. In an ironic twist, that outcome pleases consumer advocates more than it does some bankers.

Prices for bad-debt portfolios have gone up in recent weeks, with prices for fresh debt improving at a faster rate than older receivables, according to several industry insiders.