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BUSINESS Saturday 9 September 2017
A25

Lawmakers slam Equifax US stocks waver again as energy firms fall

breach; what you can do refiners based in the Gulf
Coast or Southeast could
By KEN SWEET take losses and bad debt
AP Business Writer at credit card companies
NEW YORK (AP) — There’s no way around it: The news will increase, and since the
from credit reporting company Equifax that 143 mil- storm will push the Federal
lion Americans had their information exposed is ex- Reserve to keep interest
tremely serious. rates lower for a bit lon-
Crucial pieces of personal data that criminals could ger, that will hurt banks by
use to commit identity theft — Social Security num- keeping interest rates low
bers, birthdates, address histories, legal names — on loans.
were all obtained. That’s information that cannot The Standard & Poor’s 500
change. And once that data is out there, it’s basi- index lost 3.67 points, or 0.1
cally out there forever. percent, to 2,461.43. The
“The crown jewels of personal information were ex- Dow Jones industrial aver-
posed and potentially stolen,” said John Ulzheimer, age gained 13.01 points, or
an independent credit consultant who previously This photo shows the New York Stock Exchange at sunset, in 0.1 percent, to 21,797.79.
lower Manhattan. Technology and energy companies skidded
worked at Equifax. Friday while banks and insurers recovered some of their recent The Nasdaq composite
Equifax’s key role in the financial industry makes this losses, leaving major U.S. indexes little changed on the day and dropped 37.68 points, or
breach more alarming than previous ones at Yahoo moderately lower for the week. 0.6 percent, to 6,360.19.
or retailers. It’s a storehouse of personal informa- (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer) The Russell 2000 index of
tion, like how much people owe on their houses and By MARLEY JAY Caribbean. The enormous smaller-company stocks
whether they have court judgments against them. AP Markets Writer storm killed at least 21 rose 0.76 points, or 0.1 per-
Lenders rely on the information collected by three big NEW YORK (AP) — Technol- people, a total that is ex- cent, to 1,399.43. More
credit bureaus — Equifax, TransUnion and Experian — ogy and energy compa- pected to rise as rescuers stocks fell than rose on the
to help them decide whether to approve financing nies skidded Friday while continue to search. It also New York Stock Exchange.
for homes, cars and credit cards. Credit checks are banks and insurers recov- left thousands of people Equifax, which hit all-time
sometimes done by employers when deciding whom ered some of their recent homeless, and more than highs last month, took its
to hire for a job. losses, leaving major U.S. in- a million people in Florida biggest one-day loss since
Atlanta-based Equifax said Thursday that “criminals” dexes little changed on the and Georgia have been 1999 after it said a cyber in-
exploited a U.S. website application to access the day and moderately lower ordered to evacuate. Irma trusion exposed Social Se-
files between mid-May and July of this year. It discov- for the week. is expected to hit Florida curity numbers and other
ered the hack July 29, but waited until Thursday to Credit monitoring compa- over the weekend with information from 143 mil-
warn consumers. ny Equifax plunged after it winds surpassing 130 miles lion Americans between
Beyond the usual steps of checking credit reports disclosed a data breach per hour. mid-May and late July.
regularly and watching for abnormal transactions on that affects 143 million Experts think the storms will Equifax tumbled $19.49, or
your accounts, it may be time to take more extreme Americans. Competitors slow down U.S. economic 13.7 percent, to $123.23.
measures to lock down your information. TransUnion and Experian growth in the third quar- TransUnion fell $1.89, or 3.8
The strongest possible option a person can take im- also fell, while data security ter. While that’s likely to percent, to $47.50 and Ex-
mediately is placing what’s known as a credit freeze companies like Symantec be temporary, David Cha- perian fell 0.7 percent in
on their files with the major credit bureaus. That locks jumped as investors ex- lupnik, head of equities at London.
down a person’s information, making it impossible to pected they will get more Nuveen Asset Manage- Security software company
open new accounts and bank cards in their name. business. ment, said the effect on the Symantec jumped $1.03, or
But taking that option also locks you out from open- Grocery stores and food stock market could linger 3.4 percent, to $31.63 and
ing new accounts. It also can come with a fee with companies slumped as because it will be hard for competitor FireEye rose
each of the bureaus, depending on which state you Kroger said stiff competi- investors to tell how much 24 cents, or 1.5 percent,
live in. tion forced it to cut prices. of any individual compa- to $16.01. Insurer Chubb
“The credit freeze is the nuclear option of credit pro- Target also said it is low- ny’s problems are caused rose $5.97, or 4.4 percent,
tection. But in the wake of a breach this big, it’s worth ering prices. Technology by the weather. “The next to $140.85 and XL Group
considering,” said Matt Schulz, an analyst with Cred- companies including Ap- couple of months are go- regained $2.13, or 5.8 per-
itCards.com. ple, Facebook, Intel and ing to be pretty cloudy,” cent, to $38.61. Still, inves-
Consumers will need to be more careful about check- chipmakers weakened. Chalupnik said. tors expect the industry to
ing their credit reports. U.S. law gives every American Hurricane Irma continued He said insurance com- take steep losses from Irma
the right to get those files for free once a year from to devastate islands in the panies, cruise lines, and oil and Hurricane Harvey.q
the three major bureaus. While many websites market
access to your credit reports, the official one is annu-
alcreditreport.com. US consumer borrowing increased in July
It’s best to spread those requests out over the year —
do one every four months, experts say. And expect By JOSH BOAK port closely for clues about other debt secured by real
to check this information not just in the immediate fu- AP Economics Writer the direction of consumer estate, including home-eq-
ture, but for the long term — potentially years. WASHINGTON (AP) — spending, which accounts uity loans. Increased loan
“Bad guys can be very patient with data. This should American consumers bor- for about 70 percent of demand is often a sign
be a wake-up call to be even more diligent with your rowed more heavily in July, economic activity. of continued economic
information,” Schulz said. increasing their debt pri- Non-revolving credit, growth. The economy ex-
Ulzheimer says an option consumers should consid- marily in a category that which includes auto and panded at 3 percent an-
er is setting up fraud alerts on your files. That would includes auto and student student loans, increased nual clip in the April-June
require creditors to contact you directly, usually by loans. $15.8 billion. The category quarter. The gains suggest
phone, for approval before allowing an account to The Federal Reserve said that includes credit cards that that overall growth is
be opened. Friday that overall consum- advanced $2.6 billion. back on track after a lack-
That gives people a more active role, rather pas- er credit rose $18.5 billion in The July increase brought luster start during the first
sively monitoring or freezing your entire file. Bureaus July, up from the $11.9 bil- consumer credit to a total three months of 2017. Hiring
also must contact each other when a fraud alert is lion increase in June. Econ- of $3.75 trillion. The Fed’s has occurred at a slightly
monthly credit report does slower pace than in 2016,
omists and financial mar-
placed.q
kets watch the credit re- not include mortgages or but it remains healthy. q