Consumer Credit Rose Before The Holidays Too, Sort Of

You have been reading reports over and over about yet more good news on the retail front as far as consumer spending is concerned.  A new Federal Reserve report on consumer credit in the U.S. is showing that it wasn’t just the holidays.  October saw increased consumer borrowing again.

What is interesting that the rise in consumer borrowing was not really by using credit cards.  The increase was a net $7.65 billion in total consumer credit during the month of October.  Dow Jones had a forecast of a gain of $6.5 billion and Bloomberg had a consensus target from economists pegged at a gain of $7.5 billion.

The revolving credit figure, the month-to-month borrowing which includes credit cards only showed a U.S. entire gain of $366 million.  The rest came from debt tied to personal loans, auto loans, and even student loans.

What is interesting is that some economists will be disappointed with this.  Some were looking for in excess of $10 billion.

Today’s gain in credit may seem misleading.  At any rate, it was not the consumers reenacting a Civil War battle with the phrase “CHARGE!” all over the economy.