The conference was attended by more than 270 representatives of the consumer credit information industry from around the world, as well as by representatives of the financial services industry and other interested parties. In a context where the global economy and its recovery is still a concern, the conference focused on the latest issues affecting credit and credit reporting around the world, including the EU and US regulatory environments, cyber security, fraud, data quality, and other topics relevant to the industry.Enrico Lodi, Vice President of ACCIS and General Manager of CRIF S.p.A., chaired the session titled “Similarities and differences in lending to the SME and consumer markets”.
Starting from the recent ACCIS Membership Survey on National SME Information Markets, Lodi focused his attention on the EU credit reporting industry and its contribution to supporting SME access to credit. Indeed, despite SMEs being the lifeblood of the EU economy (in 2012 SMEs accounted for 99.8% of all European companies and 66.5% of all European jobs), SMEs have increasingly been turned down for credit since the beginning of the financial crisis.
ln order to support SMEs (as pointed out in the draft report “Facilitating SME financing through improved Credit Reporting”), an efficient creditworthiness assessment of SMEs should comprise different kinds of information, including structural, owner and directorship information, financials, credit repayment behavior, trade credit and qualitative information. Even if 75% of ACCIS members collect data on SMEs, the depth and breadth of the collected data varies significantly across Europe. The required “efficient assessment” may be impeded by obstacles such as strict data protection regulations, regulatory restrictions in accessing SME data, and the lack of requirements for SMEs to actually submit data.
In conclusion, Lodi stressed that, if allowed, the credit reporting industry can effectively facilitate SME financing through cross-referencing data on owners, directorship, a.s.o, relevant and updated financial and trade credit data, more qualitative information (such as media searches and industry benchmarks), and real market-adapted information (i.e. information on alternative funding).
