Memories of WaMu… [footnoted.org]
While most of the slides aren’t all that different from the earnings release, a few definitely stood out. We particularly liked slide #10, which showed a sharp (and scary) increase in 30-day delinquencies for so-called prime borrowers. At the end of June, that number was running around 9%, compared with around 5% at the end of 2008 — yet another indication that the rosy economic headlines lately may be a tad bit overstated.
We also liked slide #19, which had Chase’s card services losses approaching 10%. That sounds pretty awful until you look at the very next line which notes that WaMu’s card losses “to approach 24% by the end of 2009.” Let’s think about that for just a moment: does this really mean that nearly 1 out of every 4 people who had a WaMu card aren’t able to pay it back?
