How to Lend Money to Strangers

"It started by just going out and networking, listening to people, asking them what worked, what didn't work, you know, ringing up estate agents saying, look, I'd love to do your mortgages and walking up and down the high street with my briefcase."As much as I love featuring VC-funded, AI-powered, alternative data-consuming startups on this show, it is well worth remembering that there's still a very big place for businesses built on human interactions - provided those interactions lead to better products, of course. In today's episode, I'm speaking to Chris Schutrups, founder of The Mortgage Hut and some of the UK's leading mortgage brands. We cover that story of shaking hands and building businesses, of understanding people's needs and building products for them, but we also look at the role of professional advice in a world flooded with opinions, the current mortgage landscape and its opportunities there for brokers and lenders to work together for the benefit of borrowers, and how a changing drinking culture is changing pubs.The Mortgage Hut is at home online at https://www.themortgagehut.co.uk/ They're also on LinkedIn over at https://www.linkedin.com/company/themortgagehut/ (Police Mortgages are there, too)And speaking of LinkedIn, Chris is kind of a big deal on the platform, so you can join the 20,000+ of us following his insights over at https://www.linkedin.com/in/schutrups/Or if it was the pubs that caught your interest, check out the great options at https://hendersonpub.co/. With summer finally showing signs of its approach, I might well take on the 2-hour coastal drive to get me to Romsey and The Hunters Inn.I'm on LinkedIn, too, and eager to reach Chris's heights so I'm always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - and follow the show's page, tooMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24And finally, I'm also co-creating a new podcast called hAIghtened senses which will look at the intersection between human senses and technology, especially AI-powered technology. You can already start to follow it wherever you're listening to this one - there's only a trailer there at the moment, but we've recorded some of the early episodes and it's going to be a fun ride!Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

“Buy now and pay in up to 24 monthly instalments using your existing credit card.​ Zero interest. Zero fees. Zero new credit.” With copy that good, you might not actually need to listen to this week’s episode 😉 But please do, it’s a really good one as we hear first hand from one of South Africa’s most exciting new fintech founders. Float is all about taking a payment tool that you already know and love, stripping away the cost, to providing cash flow management that enables spend without an unnecessary expansion of unsecured credit.Float is at home at https://www.float.co.za/ And on social media at https://www.instagram.com/float.co.za/ and at https://www.linkedin.com/company/floatcoza/ Or reach out to Alex directly at https://www.linkedin.com/in/alex-forsyth-thompson-cfa-cfp%C2%AE-6b42a75a/ If you’re interested in Guy Kawasaki’s new book, you can buy it here: https://guykawasaki.com/books/think-remarkable/ (or at any online bookstore)I'm on LinkedIn and always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please do reach out, and follow the show's page, tooMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24And finally, I'm also co-creating a new podcast called hAIghtened senses which will look at the intersection between human senses and technology, especially AI-powered technology. You can already start to follow it wherever you're listening to this one - there's only a trailer there at the moment, but we've recorded some of the early episodes and it's going to be a fun ride!Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Always curious, always outspoken, Carolyn Rohm has a deep passion for helping analysts and analytical teams to engage with the wider business and stakeholders to deliver solutions that provide real value and bottom-line benefits. In today’s episode, we talk about her career in credit risk, about the different nuances of credit risk analytics in high-risk and low-risk environments, about credit scores and credit strategies, about analytics for modern collections, and about how to build teams with hard and soft skills.Carolyn is at home online at https://www.carolynrohm.com/ (or just straight in and book a complimentary 30 minute chat at https://calendly.com/carolynrohm/30min?month=2024-04) Luckily, much of Carolyn’s insight and wisdom is captured in her book - It’s a Risky Business: A field Guide to Retail Consumer Credit Analytics - which you can get from her site but also on Amazon.com and .co.uk and, I imagine, all the others.But also feel free to find her on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carolynrohm/ Scores4All is on LinkedIn, too, but their homepage is over here: https://www.scores4all.io/ I'm on LinkedIn and always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please do reach out, and follow the show's page, tooAnd finally, I'm also co-creating a new podcast called hAIghtened senses which will look at the intersection between human senses and technology, especially AI-powered technology. You can already start to follow it wherever you're listening to this one - there's only a trailer there at the moment, but we've recorded some of the early episodes and it's going to be a fun ride!Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The global covid pandemic shut down a lot of things, but new vehicle supply chains were among the hardest hit. A knock-on effect of that was that Taran, an advanced analytics and AI consultancy saw their hot lead for a new contract evaporate. But sometimes setbacks are really opportunities in disguise, and as Taran's leadership team adjusted to put all their eggs in their remaining project, they realised that they were more than a consultancy, they had a product on their hands - and, more or less, that's how Taran Decision Manager was born.In today's episode, I'm speaking to Martin Chudoba, co-founder and CEO about that journey, and about how Taran DM can help lenders to automate and improve their complex, data-driven decisions.As you'll hear, you can find Taran on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/taran-ai/ Which is also where you'll be able to reach out to Martin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-chudoba-76703b15/) or Steve Henderson (https://www.linkedin.com/in/steveghenderson/) who is the MD of their North American operationsOr you can go straight to the source, and find what you need over at https://tarandm.com/ I'm on LinkedIn and always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please do reach out, and follow the show's page, tooMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24But I'm also co-creating a new podcast called hAIghtened senses which will look at the intersection between human senses and technology, especially AI-powered technology. You can already start to follow it wherever you're listening to this one - there's only a trailer there at the moment, but we've recorded some of the early episodes and it's going to be a fun ride!Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Caleb Maru called M-Pesa the "company that changed Kenya forever", and the crazy thing is, its impact was even bigger than that - because the dominoes that M-Pesafirst tipped over in Kenya, seventeen years ago, are still having an impact all over East Africa. In today's episode, I'm speaking to Nassor Abubakar, an M-Pesa veteran and digital lending expert who is spreading mobile-first digital loans across Tanzania with NMB Bank.You should follow Nassor on LinkedIn for https://www.linkedin.com/in/nassabuba/ NMB is at https://www.nmbbank.co.tz/ and on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/nmb-plc/ and on Twitter, Facebook, InstagramThe Finscope Report mentioned can be accessed here: https://www.afi-global.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Finscope-Tanzania-2023-Report-Insights-that-Drive-Innovation.pdf Caleb Maru's TechSafari is at https://www.techsafari.io/ or jump straight to the M-Pesa story at https://techsafari.beehiiv.com/p/company-changed-kenya-forever I'm on LinkedIn and always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please do reach out, and follow the show's page, tooMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the world of data science, there are people like me, who have signed up for an online Python course but just not got around to starting it yet, and then there are people like Ayhan Diᶊ, who, given a spare month, create a Python package to succeed the highly successful CreditR by simplifying tasks such as variable analysis, model development, and calibration and validation with unparalleled efficiency 😂Ayhan Diş is a Quant Professional renowned for shaping sophisticated data-driven solutions across diverse sectors, and we discuss what AI and ML can bring to the world of credit risk modelling, a future with Generative AI tools further improving our toolbox, and what regulators have to consider in their rulings.You can explore CreditPy on PyPI (https://pypi.org/project/creditpy/) and GitHub (https://github.com/ayhandis/creditpy)You can reach out to Ayhan directly on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/ayhandis/ I'm on LinkedIn and always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please do reach out, and follow the show's page, tooMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Oh, and In this episode, I got to have a bit of fun incorporating Daniele's drumming into the introduction - isolating them from the full track using https://splitter.ai/Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"Data is a bit like the blood of an organisation. It goes everywhere. However, because it goes everywhere, you cannot just silo it somewhere. Of course, you need to have some standards around data, but every part of the of a business has to be responsible for the data". Daniele Forni cuts through systems and technologies to solve the complex data issues that otherwise prevent financial institutions and startups from unlocking their data potential. And luckily, he loves sharing those insights with us: on LinkedIn, at conferences, in articles, in free-to-download reports such as his Guide to Data for AI, and in books for professionals and their kids alike! You can find all of Daniele's work at https://www.danieleforni.com/ Or follow him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danieleforni/ And he's just moved to Hong Kong, so if you're there, pop into HSBC and say hello 😁The Pirate and R is on your local Amazon or directly at www.littledatascientist.co.uk  Is It Pronounced Data or Data? is at https://lnkd.in/e3HZRN-d (USA), https://lnkd.in/excjrGCW (UK), https://lnkd.in/eAy2nsPT (IT), and https://lnkd.in/eyYdYw3U (ITA)Daniele's music (Doctor Shall Burn) is at https://open.spotify.com/artist/4KR0BUcZj5eOV9mxLgrniw?si=SPhptSMoTU-GchQruC-PmA I'm on LinkedIn and always open to new genuine connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please do reach out, and follow the show's page, tooMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Oh, and In this episode, I got to have a bit of fun incorporating Daniele's drumming into the introduction - isolating them from the full track using https://splitter.ai/ Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Designers speak about 'the job to be done' - you don’t need a taxi or an Uber or tuk-tuk, you need to get home to bed; you don’t need a mortgage, you need to finance your house purchase; you don’t need to spend every second weekend researching market rates, you just need to be on the best deal you qualify for. In this episode, I speak to Vincent Turner about Australian mortgages, about startups and why ‘early-stage businesses’ is perhaps a better term, about design thinking and deep working, and about a rather special belt.Uno is at home online at https://unohomeloans.com.au/  Or on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/uno-home-loans/ You should check out Yoku belts at https://yokumensbelt.com/ (you know you need a smart new belt)And you should also follow Vincent at https://www.linkedin.com/in/vhturner/ LinkedIn is also where you can find and connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange (please do reach out, follow the show's page, and share the content with your networks)Meanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rwanda is rising as a regional financial centre, catching the East African fintech wave to drive economic and social transformation and to broaden financial inclusion. In today's episode, I'm speaking to TransUnion's CEO for Rwanda and Head of Africa Growth Regions, Sam Tayengwa to hear about the energy and progress that's bubbling to the surface there. We talk about mobile loans, of course, but also the emergence of old classics like mortgages and vehicle loans.TransUnion is, as Sam said, at https://www.transunion.com/ but also at https://www.transunion.co.za/ and https://www.transunionafrica.com/rwanda (I think he got that a little wrong in the episode)You can jump straight to Sam at https://www.linkedin.com/in/samtayengwa/, he's well worth the follow, and also check our TransUnion Africa's regional president, Lee Naik at https://www.linkedin.com/in/naikl/ and subscribe to his Elewa newsletter at https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/elewa-africa-thinking-6706525337850781696/ LinkedIn is where you can find and connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange (please do reach out, follow the show's page, and share the content with your networks)Meanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The story of East African fintech is built around the mobile phone. Not the smartphone, mind you, but the humble feature phone. In markets where all but the most significant of locations lacked an established infrastructure of landlines and local bank branches, these phones leapfrogged both: powered by pre-paid sim cards that often served as a secondary currency and cleverly leveraged USSD technologies. But it has been seventeen years since M-PESA arrived on the scenes and yet traditional credit tools have often failed to cross the floor - in Uganda, the credit bureaus are filled with the data of there are just 2.4 million traditionally banked consumers, while a further 14 million sit waiting, with their data-rich mobile banking histories all but ignored.But no more. In today's epsidoe I'm speaking to Charles Wandia of gnuGRID who, with Airtel, have built a national-level mobile credit score.gnuGRID is the first and only indigenous credit reference bureau in Uganda, enabling financial inclusion through credit information sharing - and you can find them online at https://gnugridcrb.com/ You can also watch the official launch of that score at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VbEI_0l57A&t=19s gnuGRID is also on LinkedIn, of course, as is Charles Wandia: https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-wandia-983b4a65/As you'll hear on the show, Charles also offers tailor-made training on credit scorecard development via Credit Tick Consulting at https://www.linkedin.com/company/credit-risk-tick-consulting/Speaking of LinkedIn, that's where you can also find and connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange (please do reach out, follow the show's page, and share the content with your networks)Meanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"At its core, Credit Canary is a data platform that consolidates and reconciles multiple different data sources in a standardised way to produce a really rich set of flags and real contextual insights. And the essence of that is flexibility within lending. With the data that we have, there is a great opportunity not just to help make better decisions, but to help make better lending products." - James Fell, Founder and CEOAll too often, a borrower and their unique circumstances are thought about at the point of application and then entirely forgotten until a payment or two is missed. That might have been OK in a world of slow and scarce data, because what else could you do, but that excuse doesn't hold up any more - and with credit data, open banking data, and more, Credit Canary are helping us to put that right.You can find Credit Canary and view their offerings at https://www.creditcanary.co.uk/ James gives his email in the episode, or you can find him on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesafell/ In fact, the whole team is available there (https://www.creditcanary.co.uk/about) And while you're there, find and connect with me at https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"It's important that in every interest rate environment, in every market environment, an average family can afford an average home" - Arjan Verbeek, co-founder at Perenna Bank.The UK mortgage market has long been underpinned by the belief that, as long as the music kept playing, you would be able to refinance from one lender's short-term teaser rate to the next, without ever having to pay the full price... but then the music stopped and UK borrowers found themselves saddled with fast-rising standard variable rates. Household budgets were torn to shreds, and all while inflation ran rampant on the High Street, too.Few escaped. And perhaps fewer still realised that variable rates were the reason they'd been unable to qualify for a mortgage in the first place. Variable rates can, of course, vary, and so, not wanting to carry the risk for this, lenders build a buffer to protect themselves through both a regulatory stress-test applied to affordability calculation and a significant down payment requirement. In a world where we all have to stretch ourselves incredibly thin to afford a house, that can be the difference between renting again and owning.If only there was another way... like, say, the way they've been doing it in Denmark for the last two hundred years! In today's episode, I'm speaking to Arjan Verbeek, co-founder and CEO at Perenna Bank and vocal proponent of fixed-price long-term mortgages in the UK.Perenna Bank is over at: https://perenna.com/They're also on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/perenna/As is Arjan himself, who is well worth the follow: https://www.linkedin.com/in/%F0%9F%87%B3%F0%9F%87%B1-arjan-verbeek-5884681/And while you're there, find and connect with me at https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Big data analytics used to require multiple sources of data, fed into your systems via a complex array of pipes of varying structural integrity: leaks, hassles, and something to be left to only the most advanced of data organisations. In today's episode, we find out how all that has changed:"As the name suggests, we are one big data pipe with a lot of information flowing through it, and we fuse that with AI to produce some high-value analytical products coming out the other end. And this 360 degree view of a customer, with more than 500 unique attributes, is a pretty powerful position to be in. And from there, we can do some wonderful things in real-time."1datapipe is at home at https://www.1datapipe.com/ and that's where you can arrange a demoOr you can find both 1datapipe (https://www.linkedin.com/company/1datapipe/) and the wider Provenir Group (https://www.linkedin.com/company/provenir-global/) on LinkedInAnd while you're there, come and find and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeMeanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Japan is an uncommon blend of known and unknown: I drive a Nissan, you might drive a Toyota, my TV is a Sony, and since my time in Hong Kong, my go-to beer on hot days is an ice-cold pint of Asahi... but I know little about their FinTech scene. So, to set that right, I sat down with Morris Iwai, a seasoned business executive with 20+ years of experience in the credit card, consumer lending, and payments industries of the US, Taiwan, Singapore, and, of course, Japan.Morris shares that experience - and some hard numbers - as we cover:An overview of the credit card and payments markets in Japan Tokyo, the new Fintech Hub in AsiaDigital Payment trends and the push towards cashless Insight on the Japanese consumer mindset The rise of BNPL and leading players in Japan Acceleration of e-commerce spend Challenges with the credit underwriting process  The state of Open Banking in Japan The impact of Digital Wallets and QR payment providers Future of payments in Japan and new opportunities You can find Morris on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/morris-iwai/And while you're there, come and find and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeOr see this all happening in the flesh by attending one of these great upcoming events: Japan Fintech Festival, Sushi Tech Tokyo, or Fintech SummitNeed help launching your startup in Japan? Check out www.launchstarz.com/ for more details.Meanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You can't afford rigid systems in a world that moves fast, but also, for a long time at least, you couldn't afford agile systems in a more dollars and cents sort of way. But these days you can.Timvero's solutions are all laid out at https://timvero.com/ or head towards a demo by jumping straight to https://timvero.com/request-a-demo/ You're welcome to start a discussion with Dmitriy over on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/dmitriy-wolkenstein-7a19b79a/ And while you're there, come and find and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeAs mentioned more than once in this episode, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When you want a model, you typically start with a target variable in mind. But sometimes that's not possible. Perhaps you're entering a new market or expanding into a new niche, you could start lending on a small scale and wait to see what happens. We used to call that a deep risk test, often somewhat euphemistically when a cohort was accidentally approved through a gap in the system. But even if you're happy to take a chance, that takes time - there's no way to shortcut a 12-month outcome. Enter the u-score, Matogen AI's novel approach to applying an analytical layer to the old-fashioned expert model. In today's episode, I'm speaking to Jacobus Eksteen to learn more about how they did this with Open Banking data from DirectID. This provides a way to jumpstart an Open Banking modelling project, but Open Banking has many arrows in its quiver, so I also speak to Clare McCaffery about the state of the landscape.Clare is Chief Commercial Officer at DirectID and can be found at https://www.direct.id/ Jacobus is CEO at Matogen Applied Insights and they can be found at https://ai.matogen.com/ And of course, they're both on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/clare-mccaffery-045a7113/ and https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacobuseksteen/ And while you're there, come and find and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeAs mentioned more than once in this episode, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"Causality is the new explainability."We all know credit limit increases are one of the most, if not the most, important levers in the card profit model. And we all know the reality of managing credit limits is far more complicated than the theory - every action has a reaction and all of that. So we focus on pulling back and releasing the spring of the pinball machine and then just get ready to react as best we can.But as data analytic techniques become more advanced, we can plan more and leave less to chance. So in this episode, I sit down with Dr Cristian Bravo, from Ontario's Western University, to talk about Sherly Alfonso-Sánchez's research into "Causal Learning for Credit Limit Adjustment in Revolving Lending Under Adversarial Goals"Western University has data science programs at https://uwo.ca/sci/datascience/index.htmlThe Banking Analytics Lab is at https://thebal.ai/If you'd like to speak to Cristian, or just stay up to date with the work he and the BAL are publishing, you can find him on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristianbravor/In our chat, Cristian mentions an early version of this research - that paper can be found and downloaded here: https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.15585Or go read Sherly's blog on this same topic at https://thebal.ai/2023/07/11/optimizing-credit-limit-adjustments-under-adversarial-goals-using-reinforcement-learning/Then come and find me on LinkedIn, and while you're there, send me a connection request: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeAs mentioned more than once in this episode, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I've got a drawer in my bedside table that is filled with an assortment of foreign notes and coins: euros and dollars and Rands that I need relatively often but that I'll nevertheless forget to take when I travel next; some Indian rupees that have long since been decommissioned; some Hong Kong dollars because how can it have taken me four years to find an excuse to get back; some, what I think are Cambodian riel; and an unseemly number of hotel room keys. It's chaotic, but even more organised people than me have to work extremely hard to keep international trade relatively efficient, with multiple accounts at different banking institutes to Rands into American dollars so those can be turned into Hong Kong dollars.Or at least they did, Currencycloud makes this easy to do, enabling efficient cross-border lending at cross-border lending operations at scale. One example doing it really well, is the Spanish startup Ritmo.Ritmo is at home online at https://www.getritmo.com/ and on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/ritmo-capital/And as he mentions on the show, you can either email Jorge directly, or find him at https://www.linkedin.com/in/jorge-juttner-cfa-55a3a068/Currencycloud can be found at https://www.currencycloud.com/ and on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-currency-cloud/And if you'd like to learn more about what Currencycloud can do for your international business, Maggie can be found at https://www.linkedin.com/in/maggie-gemmill-779697119/LinkedIn is also where you'll find me, and when you do, send me a connection request: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeAs mentioned more than once in this episode, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

No good deed goes unpunished and no well-intentioned government loan program goes undefaulted upon, even more so when that government program was designed and implemented in the chaotic early days of the COVID lockdowns.We've all seen the headlines, but what do the numbers say, what sort of businesses have been defaulting on COVID loans in the UK? Well, Dr Maurizio Fiaschetti is writing the paper on it - along with Drs Ahmed Barakat, Meryem Duygun, Eddie Gerba (PhD), Tian Han, Enrico Onali, Afshin Sabri, Mike Tsionas and Huamao Wang - so I sat down with him to learn more.You can reach out to Maurizio at https://www.linkedin.com/in/maurizio-fiaschetti-6979073/ to learn more about the research and the publication scheduleIf you're interested in studying further at UCL, or indeed in reading their research, you can find the Institute of Finance & Technology at https://www.ucl.ac.uk/institute-finance-technology/ucl-institute-finance-technologyAnd they're also on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/ucl-institute-of-finance-and-technology/)Surprise, surprise, LinkedIn is also where you'll find me, and when you do, send me a connection request: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeMy action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24I met Maurizio while in Edinburgh at the 18th meeting of the Credit Scoring and Credit Control Conference - the next one is in two years' time and it’s well-worth planning for. In the meantime, follow the CRC’s work at https://www.crc.business-school.ed.ac.uk/homeIf you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Nearly two out of every three Colombian jobs are in the informal economy! That's a huge number that needs to come down, and no doubt it will, but until then, someone really needs to bring the benefits of formal financing to the small business owners in the informal sector. Enter Quipu with whose AI-powered loan decisions "growing is easier, fairer and more alternative".You can find Viviana on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/viviana-siless/There's a Quipu page there, too, https://www.linkedin.com/company/quipulatam/ but there's even more information on their homepage over at https://quipu.com.co/I am on LinkedIn, too, so feel free to find me and send me a connection request there: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrangeMy action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this very show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24I met Viviana while in Edinburgh at the 18th meeting of the Credit Scoring and Credit Control Conference - the next one is in two years time and it’s well-wroth planning for. In the meantime, follow the CRC’s work at https://www.crc.business-school.ed.ac.uk/home If you have any feedback or questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me via the contact page on this site.Keep well, Brendan Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.