In this paper, we present a brief exposition of the history of the secured credit card, beginning with its origins in California in the 1970s. We present a series of stylized facts based on a December 2015 cross section of the secured card market. We find that most secured cards require an...

We track the disposition of revolving credit card balances that existed as of March 2009 — the peak of outstanding balances in our data set — over a four-year period. We find that 75 percent of those balances had been paid off or charged off by February 2013. Charge-offs played a much...

Secured credit cards--credit cards whose limit is fully or partially collateralized by a bank deposit--are considered a gateway product to mainstream credit access. As consumers demonstrate good usage and repayment behavior, they may be offered the opportunity to graduate to an unsecured credit...