Available data show a clear deterioration in U.S. consumer credit quality over 2023, especially in unsecured products, consistent with Friedberg’s call, even though it did not become a full-blown systemic crisis.

• Credit cards and autos (core of his thesis): The New York Fed reported that in 2023 credit card delinquencies “surged more than 50%,” with serious (90+ day) delinquencies rising from just over 4% of balances at the end of 2022 to 6.4% by Q4 2023—about a 59% jump. Total household debt reached $17.5T and the share of debt 90+ days past due rose from ~1.0% to ~1.4%. Fed researchers emphasized that transitions into delinquency for credit cards and auto loans were above pre‑pandemic levels and signaled “increased financial stress, especially among younger and lower‑income households.”(cnbc.com)(cnbc.com)(idcfp.com)(newyorkfed.org) Separately, auto loans showed similar strain: by late 2023, 7.7% of auto loan balances were 30 days late, the highest since 2010, indicating many borrowers were failing to keep up with payments.(forbes.com) These are sizable, broad‑based deteriorations in consumer credit performance and defaults in exactly the segments he highlighted.

• BNPL: The BNPL sector is opaque, but surveys summarized by the Federal Reserve and others indicate that around one‑fifth of BNPL users had already made at least one late payment in 2023, with that share rising further in 2024, highlighting meaningful repayment problems among users of this form of consumer credit as it expanded.(fool.com) Regulators like the CFPB also found BNPL borrowers were more likely to have delinquencies on traditional credit products, reinforcing the picture of a stressed subset of consumers relying on layered credit.(nortonrosefulbright.com)

• Mortgages and overall system: Where Friedberg slightly over‑shot was in how broad the wall would be. Mortgage performance in 2023 remained exceptionally strong: the MBA reported overall mortgage delinquency at or near the lowest levels in the survey’s history (e.g., 3.37% in Q2 2023, the lowest since 1979), and CoreLogic described mortgage delinquency rates as hovering near record lows, with serious delinquencies around 1.1%—far below post‑2008 crisis norms.(mba.org)(newslink.mba.org)(worldpropertyjournal.com) The New York Fed likewise noted that while delinquencies ticked up, overall delinquency rates in 2023 were still below 2019 levels.(reuters.com) So the “wall” was not system‑wide or mortgage‑driven.

On balance, though, Friedberg’s core prediction—that sometime in 2023 there would be a significant deterioration in U.S. consumer credit performance, with many consumers unable to meet obligations and a noticeable spike in defaults in categories like credit cards (and related unsecured credit)—did occur. The magnitude of the deterioration in credit cards and auto loans, and the Fed’s own characterization of rising delinquencies and financial stress, align well with his call, even if mortgages stayed unusually healthy. Therefore, the prediction is best classified as right.