Credit Cards Surge Again in November

Credit card balances came close to a pandemic recovery in November at credit unions, but post-holiday payoffs are likely to lower balances again.

Credit unions held $64.3 billion in credit card debt in November, up 4.1% from a year earlier and up 3% from October, according to the Fed’s G-19 Consumer Credit Report released Friday.

The 3% gain is nearly double the 1.6% average October-to-November gain for credit unions, based on Fed data from 2015 through 2019. December gains are typically near 3%, but balances typically fall about 1% per month in January and February.

However, credit unions lost share as banks made even stronger gains.

Banks held $916.5 billion in credit card debt, up 7% from a year earlier and up 3.7% from October.

Credit unions’ share was 6.3% in November, down from 6.5% a year earlier and 6.4% in October.

NCUA data as of Sept. 30 showed large credit unions have been able to make gains, while balances have dwindled at smaller ones.

Large credit unions, those with more than $4 billion in assets, held 39.1 billion in card debt as of Sept. 30, up 3.7% from a year earlier. Meanwhile, balances fell 2.6% to $12.9 billion at mid-sized credit unions, those with assets of $1 billion to $3.9 billion, and fell 3.1% to $9.7 billion at small credit unions.

The 10 largest holders of credit union debt held nearly half the movement’s balances: $28 billion as of Sept. 30, up 5.4% from a year earlier. They were:

1. Navy Federal Credit Union, Vienna, Va. ($151 billion in assets, 10.9 million members), which held $20.6 billion, up 7%.
2. PenFed Credit Union, Tysons, Va. ($29.7 billion in assets, 2.4 million members), which held $1.7 billion, up 2.3%.
3. BECU, Tukwila, Wash. ($29.6 billion in assets, 1.3 million members), which held $1.1 billion, down 3.1%.
4. State Employees’ Credit Union, Raleigh, N.C. ($50.9 billion in assets, 2.6 million members), which held $819.7 million, up 8.2%.
5. SchoolsFirst Federal Credit Union, Santa Ana, Calif. ($26.4 billion in assets, 1.2 million members), which held $731 million, up 0.6%.
6. Suncoast Credit Union, Tampa, Fla. ($14.3 billion in assets, 985,025 members), which held $711.9 million, down 4.2%.
7. Pennsylvania State Employees Credit Union, Harrisburg ($8 billion in assets, 501,661 members), which held $688.2 million, down 2.4%.
8. America First Federal Credit Union, Riverdale, Utah ($16.4 billion in assets, 1.2 million members), which held $586.5 million, up 3%.
9. Digital Federal Credit Union, Marlborough, Mass. ($9.8 billion in assets, 968,903 members), which held $544.1 million, down 0.1%.
10. Mountain America Federal Credit Union, Salt Lake City ($13.8 billion in assets, one million members), which held $528.3 million, up 7.1%.