"Repayment data can bring more underserved borrowers into the credit system," Moses Obika said

Credit evaluation problems for small and micro business owners and informal sector borrowers in Nigeria

In Nigeria, millions of small and micro business owners and informal sector borrowers have difficulty obtaining credit evaluations through traditional lending institutions, even if they have successfully borrowed in the past and repaid them on time. This challenge does not always stem from a lack of lending activity. In many cases, transactions that demonstrate the borrower's ability to continue to make payments occur outside the formal credit system used by traditional financial institutions.

Without established credit records, written proof of income, collateral or other traditional records, these borrowers are often difficult to assess when seeking credit from other sources. Addressing the gap, Moses Obika, Regxta's chief technology officer (CTO), said repayment data could provide another way to make underserved borrowers more "visible" in the credit system.

Obica pointed out: "Many underserved borrowers are not necessarily those who have never borrowed or repaid. The problem is that a large amount of repayment history flows in places that traditional lenders cannot reach. If these histories are properly documented, it will help bring more people into the credit system."

His view is that even if borrowers initially do not have a traditional credit history, they can still establish a useful financial history over time as long as their lending and repayment behavior are consistently recorded. This would provide lenders with evidence of how customers handled past credit, rather than evaluating each application in the absence of information on past lending behavior.

从手动管理到数字化平台的转型

这一观点部分源于奥比卡在Regxta的工作经历。Regxta是一家服务于通常缺乏完整财务文件的客户的借贷公司，奥比卡曾参与开发相关的借贷技术。Regxta于2018年以“The Bells Dynamic Option”之名开始放贷，并于2021年更名。在此之前，它已拥有客户、外勤代理人以及活跃的贷款组合。同年8月，奥比卡以合同工程师的身份加入该公司，当时大部分借贷业务仍以手工方式管理。

“当我刚开始在Regxta工作时，没有应用程序，没有网络平台，什么都没有，”奥比卡回忆道。“借贷是真实的，客户是真实的，代理人也是真实的，但几乎没有任何内容以可信赖的方式被记录下来。在我们考虑信用评分之前，我们必须先能看到完整的账目。”

缺乏可靠的中央记录成为奥比卡在该角色中遇到的主要问题之一。由于缺乏关于贷款和还款的一致性信息，公司在追踪个体借款人长期表现方面可用的数据也较少。

2022年9月，当奥比卡出任Regxta首席技术官时，他开始领导开发一个数字借贷平台，旨在将这些记录整合到一个系统中。该平台于2023年10月正式上线。截至近三年后，Regxta表示已有超过10万笔贷款通过该系统处理，注册客户达3.5万人，累计发放金额超过100亿奈拉。

Constructing alternative credit profiles

According to Regxta, about 80% of customers do not have formal identification when applying to the company, and many also lack established credit documents, payroll or traditional collateral. The lending process allows new customers to start small and establish a record through subsequent repayments. Over time, these activities provide more information about how borrowers manage credit.

"Someone may not have traditional credit documents to start out, but each successful repayment adds information to that borrower," Obica said. "The more consistently this information is captured, the more 'transparent' the person becomes when making credit decisions."

For Obica, the numbers recorded by Regxta in the past three years are not only a measure of the size of lending, but also represent the repayment history generated by thousands of borrowers that did not previously exist in an easily assessable form. He further emphasized that if lenders can take advantage of reliable repayment records, borrowers without traditional credit documents can have another way to demonstrate how they manage credit.

This is particularly important for informal sector workers and micro-business owners, whose financial activities may not produce documents traditionally used for credit decisions. In addition to relying on formal employment records, collateral or existing credit documents, lenders can also consider recorded borrowing and repayment history when evaluating customers.

For borrowers who make repeated and successful repayments, Obica insists that such records reduce the possibility of having to start from scratch every time they apply to a new lender. "If someone consistently borrows and pays back, that history should reflect," he said. "Repayment data can help more underserved borrowers establish records that the broader credit system can recognize."