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Question

Where can I get a guaranteed credit card?

Answer

Table 1 below, given by Prosper (2005), shows data from Experian, one of the 3 main US and UK credit bureaus(along with Equifax in the UK and TransUnion in the USA and internationally). (The data actually comes from installment loans , but can also be used as a fair approximation for credit card loans ). The table shows the loss rates from borrowers with various credit scores. To get a desired rate of return, a lender would add the desired rate to the loss rate to determine the interest rate. Although borrowers certainly differ, a rational lender usually predicts that borrowers will behave as others from their credit score group have behaved in the past. Banks then compete on details by making analyses of how to use data such as this along with any other data they gather from the application and history with the cardholder, to determine an interest rate that will attract borrowers by remaining competitive with other banks and still assure a profit. Debt-to-income ratio (DTI) is another important factor for determining interest rates. The bank calculates it by adding up the borrower's obligated minimum payments on loans, and dividing by the cardholder's income. If it is more than a set point (such as 20% in this example) then loans to that applicant are considered a higher risk than given by this table. These loss rates already include incomes the lenders receive from payments in collection, either from debt collection efforts after default or from selling the loans to third parties for further collection attempts, at a fraction of the amount owed.

— Source: Wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org)