Fitch Ratings issued a report on Friday predicting that annual U.S. personal bankruptcy filings are set for a fifth straight drop, though the rate of decline figures to level off over time as lending guidelines become more lax, according to a Fitch press release. Fitch projects total bankruptcy filings to fall by another 8-10 percent in 2015 in light of current economic conditions. This development comes as aggregate personal bankruptcy filings for 2014 fell over 12 percent lower year over year, another double-digit annual decrease. However, “the continued loosening of lenders' underwriting guidelines and the increase to consumers' access to credit should begin to slow the pace of the double-digit declines observed over the past four years,” said Fitch Managing Director Michael Dean. U.S. consumer credit rose for the fifth straight year in 2014, topping over $3 trillion on a seasonally adjusted basis. Read more.
For more on bankruptcy filing trends and statistics, be sure to visit ABI's statistics page.
