Credit Card Rates Hit Record High as Borrowing Costs Soar Amid Fed Hikes
Interest rates on credit cards have hit a record high as the Federal Reserve shows no signs of pivoting away from its monetary tightening policy.
The average credit card annual percentage rate (APR) has hit 19.04 percent, Ted Rossman, a senior industry analyst at Bankrate, said to The Epoch Times. This is a new record high, according to the financial website’s database going back to 1985. “The previous record was 19.00 percent in July of 1991. We started this year at 16.30 percent, so the national average has increased by 274 basis points so far in 2022,” Rossman said.
“Previously, the largest increase within a single year was 262 basis points in 2010, when the CARD Act took effect and led to huge changes in how credit card rates were set.” (The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act of 2009 was passed into law in order to protect consumers against unfair practices held by credit card issuers.)…