Apr 25, 2020 - Health

Banks and credit card providers brace for their own coronavirus damage

Illustration: Lazaro Gamio/Axios

Millions of Americans are skipping credit card payments in the face of mass unemployment caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the Wall Street Journal reports.

What's happening: Card issuers including Capital One, Discover and Synchrony are letting borrowers miss payments for a month or more, waiving late fees and forgiving some of their balances — but delinquencies are still expected to soar this year, WSJ reports.

  • Synchrony and Discover say they have enabled hundreds of thousands of borrowers to defer payments, including credit card customers.
  • Capital One says 1% of active card accounts are now in deferral programs.
  • Citigroup, Synchrony and Discover are lowering spending limits and closing cards that haven't recently been used, as consumers under stay-at-home orders avoid travel and shopping.

The big picture: More than 26 million Americans have filed jobless claims in recent weeks, meaning unemployment is likely already at Great Depression-era highs.

The bottom line: "As the economy spirals, credit-card payments are one of the first places where the effects will show up," WSJ's AnnaMaria Andriotis and Orla McCaffrey report.

Go deeper: The states having the most trouble with credit card debt

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Orion Rummler
Aug 2, 2020 - Politics & Policy

White House, Democrats no closer to reaching coronavirus stimulus deal

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi took the standoff on the next coronavirus stimulus package to ABC's "This Week" on Sunday.

Why it matters: Enhanced unemployment insurance expired for tens of millions of Americans on July 31, while those in talks to secure the next coronavirus stimulus package have made it clear that a deal is a long way off.

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Orion Rummler
Updated Aug 2, 2020 - Health

9 states set single-day coronavirus case records last week

Data: COVID Tracking Project and state health department data compiled by Axios; Map: Danielle Alberti and Naema Ahmed/Axios

Nine states set new highs last week for coronavirus infections recorded in a single day, per the COVID Tracking Project and state health departments. Five states surpassed records set the previous week.

Why it matters: This is the lowest number of states to see dramatic single-day increases since Axios began tracking weekly highs in late June.

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Axios
Updated 11 hours ago - Health

World coronavirus updates

Data: The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins; Map: Axios VisualsThe

The Philippines' economy sunk into recession as its gross domestic product shrank 16.5% in the second quarter — marking the lowest reading since 1981, official figures show.

The big picture: Millions of Filipinos went on lockdown Tuesday as cases surged past 106,300, with stay-at-home orders in place for two weeks in Manila and nearby provinces on the island of Luzon, per the BBC. The economy's contraction is the "deepest" on record, Bloomberg notes.

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