Credit trends point to pressured consumers

The stock market is looking up, and there is talk of the recession being over, but one look at the trends in Target’s credit portfolio reveal that consumers are not out of the woods. The company’s receivables declined 6.8% in September compared with a year earlier, partly by design as the company sought to mitigate its exposure to charge-offs and delinquencies. Charge-offs totaled 14.37% in September, while delinquencies totaled 6.17%.