The second debate between Democrat R. Creigh Deeds and Republican Bob McDonnell featured the most pointed and prickly exchanges between the candidates to date. The debate came as a new poll showed the race about even.

Outlook for the credit-card industry as government reforms take shape? Uncertain. Just 77 days after President Barack Obama signed the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009, and six months before it will take effect, credit-card issuers are scrambling.

Capital One Financial Corp., one of the nation’s largest credit-card issuers, reported a second-quarter loss of $275.5 million as the amount of uncollectible debt grew. But the McLean-based company, a major local employer, noted that delinquencies slowed in the quarter. The company, which also owns banks, lost 65 cents per share in the quarter compared with a profit of $452.9 million, or $1.21 per share, in the same quarter a year ago.

It could be time to kiss fixed-rate credit cards goodbye. Two of the biggest credit-card issuers in the nation—Bank of America and Chase—say they’re switching some fixed-rate cards to variable rates to manage costs in light of the sweeping new reforms to the credit-card industry. The interest on variable-rate cards is tied to the rise and fall of the prime rate. The current prime rate is around 3.25 percent.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.: $25 billion
  Morgan Stanley: $10 billion
  Goldman Sachs Group Inc.: $10 billion
  U.S. Bancorp: $6.6 billion
  Capital One Financial Corp.: $3.57 billion
  American Express Co.: $3.39 billion
  BB&T Corp.: $3.1 billion
  Bank of New York Mellon Corp.: $3.04 billion

A key government effort to ease the credit crisis reached a milestone yesterday as 10 large banks, including Virginia-based Capital One Financial Corp., said they had repaid a total of $68 billion in bailout funds. The Treasury Department said last week that the banks could begin repaying money they received under the $700 billion financial system bailout known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP. The government created the program in October as its flagship effort to address the global credit crisis and teetering financial markets.

Credit ratings agency Standard & Poor’s yesterday cut ratings on 18 banks amid concern about further weakening in the financial sector. S&P said the changes reflected its assessment that volatility will remain in the financial sector and that the industry is expected to face tighter regulatory oversight. S&P also said loan losses, which have plagued the industry for more than a year, are likely to continue to increase and could grow beyond expectations.

Losing his full-time job last year after 20 years in the corporate world has unleashed an entrepreneurial spirit in Stan Edwards. “I have no guaranteed income right now, but every day that I get up, I control my own destiny,“ said Edwards, a Hanover County resident who worked in corporate finance and operations management, most recently for LandAmerica Financial Group Inc. until the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November.

The government is preparing to overhaul another segment of the American financial system: the credit card industry. Some of the changes will help consumers better understand the costs and risks of using their cards. Requiring companies to give sufficient notice to customers when terms change also qualifies as a reasonable requirement. But restrictions on fees, interest rates, and the way payments are calculated are a double-edged sword. Thankfully, Congress pulled back from enacting a hard cap on the interest rates companies can charge on balances that are not paid off at the end of the month. Our populist legislators are, however, planning to enact a long list of restrictions and requirements that will make it more difficult for lenders to make a profit. The changes will please those who owe money on their credit cards. The debtor is king these days.

A white power discovered by a Capital One worker inside the company’s facility at 12730 Kingston Ave. in Chester caused some tense moments yesterday, but no one was hurt. A mailroom employee discovered the substance in an envelope, and company officials quickly called police and fire crews at 1:20 p.m. As a precaution, a number of mailroom employees were evacuated to the parking lot but no one had to be quarantined, Chesterfield police Lt. Doug Mooney said.

A suspicious white power discovered by a Capital One worker inside the company’s facility at 12730 Kingston Ave. in Chester caused some tense moments this afternoon but no one was hurt. A mailroom employee discovered the powdery substance in an envelope and company officials quickly called police and fire at 1:20 p.m. As a precaution, an undetermined number of mailroom employees were evacuated to the parking lot, said Chesterfield Police Lt. Doug Mooney.

Two area employers are cutting 327 jobs in the Richmond area. Capital One Financial Corp., one of the largest employers here, is eliminating 66 jobs in its U.S. credit-card customer operations at its offices in Goochland County. The cuts mark the third round of layoffs this year for the McLean-based credit-card and financial-services company, for a total of 143 local job reductions this year.

One day after issuing a lackluster quarterly earnings statement, Capital One Financial Corp. told 58 employees, including 42 at the company’s West Creek campus in Goochland County, that their jobs would be cut.

Capital One Financial Corp. reported a first-quarter loss, citing escalating credit losses and the setting aside of more money for bad loans. The company, a major Richmond-area employer, also said it expects that managed charge-off dollars in 2009 will be higher than the $8.6 billion it previously projected. The McLean-based company’s quarterly loss was $176.1 million, or 45 cents per share. That compares with earnings of $548.5 million, or $1.47 per share, a year earlier.

Katherine Busser can relate in some strange ways to the Wizard of Oz. “The wizard doesn’t do anything except remind people of all the talents they have,“ she said.