The Top 10 credit card issuers in Western Europe based on number of cards in issue last year is listed below:
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Source: Lafferty Group
Barclays Plc(BCS) of the UK tops the ranking with over 13 million cards issued thru its Barclaycard division. It is interesting to note that Bank of America’s MBNA unit(BAC) and Citibank (C) appear in this list. The credit card penetration rate in Western Europe is small relative to the US. For example, each adult in North America holds about 2.3 cards compared to just 0.7 in Western Europe.Nevertheless BofA and Citi beat other large European card issuers to make it to the top 10 list.
The British government owns 83% of Royal Bank of Scotland(RBS) and 41% of Llyods group(LYG) after the rescue of these banks during the credit crisis.
