Study Finds 95% of Black Friday Purchases Were Financed

That can’t be good.

By Braden Bjella

Published 2 weeks ago in Wtf

This year, Black Friday spending went up by around 9%. On the surface, this may seem like a good thing — people are spending money, therefore, the economy must be strong. Right? Please say that’s right!


Well, looking deeper into the data, a worrying trend emerges. First, according to professor and investor Adam Cochran, about 11% of all Black Friday purchases were made using Buy Now, Pay Later services like Klarna. Another 84% of those purchases were made with a credit card. Doing a little math here, that means that 95% of Black Friday purchases were made with money that consumers didn’t immediately have.


You might be thinking, “Well, using a credit card isn’t such a big deal!” You’re right — if you can pay the card off. However, Cochran states that 67% of this debt is not expected to be paid off within the next 30 days. This means that more people are spending money they don’t have, then not knowing exactly how or when they can pay it off.


On the plus side, we all have 75-inch TVs now! How cool is that?

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