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The Federal Reserve issued a report downplaying assertions that the banking industry contributed to bankruptcies by offering credit cards to customers who may be unable to repay the debt.
The Fed report released Thursday concluded that credit-card issuers do not solicit customers or extend credit to them without assessing their ability to repay debt. Congress requested the report as part of a 2005 bankruptcy law.
''Despite the large expansion in the proportion of households with credit cards in recent decades, measures of debt repayments relative to income show no signs of a rise in distress in the aggregate,'' the report stated.
In its review, the Fed was asked to assess whether industry practices encourage consumers to accumulate debt, how issuers determine whether a consumer will repay the debt, and how they solicit and select customers.
