This is a rather arresting chart:

That’s from Moody’s, showing how the pace of charge-offs (write-offs on bad debt) for rated US banks now exceeds the early years of the Great Depression.

The banks incurred $45bn of loan charge-offs in the third quarter, collectively, which means they’ve racked up $116bn so far this year. That translates to an estimated annualised rate of 3.4 per cent in Q3, or 2.9 per cent year to date, Moody’s says. Annual charge-offs hit 2.25 per cent in 1932 before peaking at 3.4 per cent in 1934.

Also of interest is the chart below, showing loan loss provisions — the amount of money banks set aside for bad loans — versus the charge-offs:

So Moody’s estimates loan loss provisions were...