Creditinfo West Africa Hits 20 Million Contracts
Creditinfo West Africa today marked a major milestone by hitting the 20 million contracts threshold and growing, in the regional Credit Information Bureau (BIC) making it a historic day for Creditinfo West Africa, the entire UEMOA region and Creditinfo Group.
Creditinfo IBCH (Ukraine) welcomes Kateryna Danylchenko as new GM
Kateryna has been appointed as GM of IBCH, a Credit Bureau and Analytics company in Ukraine in which Creditinfo has been a strategic investor since 2006.
Players in Baltic Markets (Latvia, Estonia) and Iceland Measure Risk better, benefitting from Covid-19 Impact Score Developed by Creditinfo.
Credit providers need to understand how COVID crisis affected their counter-parties and customers in order to better manage risk exposure and reduce losses. Current scoring models are unable to fully answer these needs as they were developed on pre-crisis data and need time to adjust to new conditions.
New initiatives and products of the Credit Bureau “Ishenim”
Together with partner IT company “Onoy” Ishenim has developed innovative mobile app that enables Lenders to collect customer’s digital consent to access his social fund data and credit report. Mobile app uses biometric verification technology (face recognition) to remotely verify person’s identity and create digital signature that is needed to submit consent. In case of successful verification solution calls Social fund to collect information about person’s income and then makes inquiry to Credit Bureau for credit report. All income data collected by mobile app is stored in Ishenim’s database together with other data. This data will be used by Lenders to verify customer’s self-reported income and also in credit scoring models.
The way leading to the ‘haven’ of Startups is grounded by Data Analysis
Lithuania‘s transformation to the startup-friendly country has been successful: last year the first “unicorn” appeared in the market, and the startup ecosystem at present includes over 900 enterprises which have the great potential for business development based on innovations. And yet, the general conception of the startups’ contribution to the country’s economy has remained stereotypical, as it is alleged that these are risky enterprises which rapidly emerge and dissolve, and that they create few workplaces. The latest analyses done by “Creditinfo” and “Startup Lithuania” reject these stereotypes.
Interview with Catherine Muraga, CIO – Stanbic Bank Kenya
We interviewed Catherine Muraga the Chief Information Officer (CIO) at Stanbic Bank Kenya – one of the largest banks in Africa. Catherine is well versed with the Information Technology (IT) landscape having worked in different industry sectors including Manufacturing, Airline and Banking industry. She provides strategic vision and operational IT leadership for the Information Technology Department and controlling all IT functions. We asked her a few questions around COVID-19 and how Stanbic Bank is working around this pandemic.
Kredītinformācijas Birojs – KIB (Credit Information Bureau) unveils new scorecard for consumers
After intense work that lasted the past several months, Kredītinformācijas Birojs finally introduced a new statistical model that forecasts the borrower’s credit risk, last month. The new credit rating predicts the probability that a borrower will default on their credit obligations for more than 60 days in the next 12 months, with the amount of obligation being at least EUR 150.
The evolution of retail credit in the banking sector in UEMOA
Covid – 19 has hit the world with a “double shock”: an unprecedented contraction in supply and demand coupled with a health-economic conundrum. For Africa, and the UEMOA region, the immediate picture is bleak. However, there is hope if the financial sector uses the situation as a trigger for accelerated transformation of lending processes and products, taking the lead from other sub-Saharan markets and levering advantage of the robust financial infrastructure in place.
Proactive Portfolio Management
The world is currently facing unprecedented economic challenges resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. This was initially reflected in drops in oil prices, followed by the falling stock market and more recently employment levels. Research by the UN suggests global GDP is likely to shrink by around one per cent this year and could contract further if restrictions on economic activity extend beyond the second quarter.
Thanks to Creditinfo, Estonia becomes the competence center of open banking
The Head of the company says a positive credit register is needed for boosting the Estonian credit market. Stefano Stoppani, Dubai-based Chairman of the Board of Creditinfo providing business information, solvency assessment and market analysis, intended to visit its offices in Estonia and the other Baltic countries in the beginning of March, but COVID-19 hampered with these plans. Europe is cautious in regulating both data protection and open banking. The aim of the PSD2 directive is to give third parties – licensed companies – access to a person’s bank account information. This is not done just because, but for providing better service, and obviously the account holder must authorize this. The third-party, for example, the creditor, can then see the income of the person and what the money is spent on. Information is needed to determine if the person is able to pay back the loan (s)he wants.
