Credit cards hit Barclays for €2bn

BARCLAYS wrote off nearly £1.7 billion (€2bn) in 2010 as a result of consumers defaulting on their credit card debt.

Its Barclaycard arm suffered impairment charges of £1.69bn worldwide, the equivalent of 5.7% of outstanding plastic debt.

But the figure was 6% down on the £1.8bn (€2.15bn) hit it took in 2009, when bad debts soared by nearly two-thirds.