Tea Leaves and the Overdue Christmas Consumer
Merchants, economists, bond traders, officials at the Federal Reserve -- everyone seems to be tracking the progress of Christmas sales day by day.</br></br>Last Saturday wasn't too good at the mall? Well, maybe that was because of bad weather in the Northeast.</br></br>Consumers seem reluctant to buy? Well, maybe they are just playing a game of chicken, planning to spend but waiting for worried merchants to mark down their goods. And like a sudden-death overtime, an extra weekend between Thanksgiving Day and Christmas this year could decide the game.</br></br>This intense interest on the part of investors and policymakers stems, of course, from the fact that about two-thirds of everything the nation produces is bought by consumers. Their spending patterns have a major impact on the course of the economy, and right now the consumer is a forecasting question mark.</br></br>One reason for that uncertainty is the sharp rise in the delinquent share of credit card accounts -- those that are 30 days or more overdue -- shown in the chart at the right. The final figure, 3.3 percent for the June-September period, was released yesterday by the American Bankers Association.