Now is a Good Time to Improve Your Credit Score

Despite the global economic turmoil banks are starting to take a little bit more risk and giving credit card cards to consumers to have less than perfect credit scores.

According to an article in the Wall Street Journal during the first six months of 2011, banks issued more than 5.4 million credit cards to people who had a credit score of less than 660. That is an increase of 64% from the previous year.

Despite the increase, banks are still being cautious. The Data this year is extremely low compared to the 14.7 million credit cards issues in the first half of 2007, before the global economy collapsed. It is not all good news for customers because limits are low and interest rates and penalties are higher.

“This is a great start for people who want to improve their credit score,” said Charles Tran, founder of CreditDonkey, a credit card comparison website. “Having a good credit score is extremely important in this day and age and the best way to achieve that is with a credit card.”

According to an article from Dow Jones Market Watch, Citigroup issued the majority of credit cards to subprime borrowers. In the third quarter they accounted for 33% of new credit card activity. Capital One Financial Corp came in second place and accounted for 27% of new credit card activity.

Some analysts are predicting that if the global economy can avoid a double dip recession, banks will continue to take more risk and start opening their doors wider to people who have had previous credit problems.

Follow @CreditDonkey or write to Neils at neils@creditdonkey.com

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