Whiz-kids at work on consumer credit are too clever by half
by Phillip Inman from Economics | The Guardian on (#33QJE)
The physics graduates who brought the financial world to its knees in 2008 have been busy again - is a similar catastrophe likely?
A warning from the Bank of England last week that the banking sector could lose as much as 30bn in unpaid debt from credit cards, personal loans and car finance if interest rates and unemployment were to rise sharply was only the latest shot across the industry's bows.
During the summer months individual central bank executives made speeches to that effect and the main consumer finance regulator has talked about tackling the worst excesses of the loan business.
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