CREDIT BUREAU SINGAPORE

THE INTERPRETATION OF FACTS

The number of people not paying all their credit cards in full is increasing. For that matter, so is the number of people with an account in arrears and the number of people with a balance on their cards of more than $20k.

It is also true however, that the percentage of people not paying all their credit cards in full is decreasing.  The percentage of people with an account in arrears is also decreasing along with percentage of people with a balance on their cards of more than $20k.

These two factual statements on the credit card market can lead the reader to quite different conclusions.

With the release of a consulting paper by MAS and the consideration of a relaxation of some requirements for unsecured credit, it is easy to see how the argument for and against can easily be made.

It’s interesting to note that in percentage terms, more consumers with a property loan have a delinquent account (2.06%) than credit card account holders (1.35%). In actual numbers, this correlates to 5366 people with a property loan in arrears and 12,934 consumers with at least one credit card in arrears.

CBS statistics (see our Credit Pulse section on www.creditbureau.com.sg) show the general trends for delinquency, revolving credit and high balance users. With a base of more than 3.9 million accounts updated every month the credit bureau database is proving a valuable resource as an indicator for consumer credit.  

Next time you read an article on the state of consumer credit in Singapore, why not check out the Credit Pulse statistics available on the CBS website to see if this validates the writer’s opinion. Of course, your interpretation may differ, but that’s the way it is with statistics.

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