By Juliet Umeh

Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Mathesis Analytics, Winston Osuchukwu, has said Nigerian banks can unlock millions of new borrowers by embracing artificial intelligence, AI, and alternative data to assess the creditworthiness of individuals currently excluded by conventional lending models.

Osuchukwu argued that millions of Nigerians operating in the informal economy have been wrongly classified as high-risk borrowers, not because they are unlikely to repay loans, but because traditional credit assessment systems fail to capture their financial activities.

According to him, many market traders, gig workers, remote employees and small business owners maintain consistent financial records through digital wallets, mobile money platforms and fintech services, yet remain largely invisible to banks that rely primarily on formal banking histories.

“The issue is not that these borrowers are inherently high-risk,” he said. “The challenge is that lenders cannot adequately see their financial behaviour using conventional credit assessment models.”

He explained that advances in AI and alternative data analytics now enable financial institutions to evaluate borrowers based on transaction history, payment behaviour and other digital footprints, allowing lenders to price risk more accurately.

According to him, this approach would enable banks to confidently extend credit to previously underserved market segments while maintaining prudent risk management.

“Nigerian banks are highly liquid, but the major constraint to credit growth has been the inability to properly assess borrowers outside the traditional financial system,” he said. “When lenders have better visibility into borrowers’ financial behaviour, they can safely expand their loan books into markets that have remained largely untapped.”

Osuchukwu noted that increased lending to these segments would benefit both financial institutions and the wider economy by providing much-needed capital to traders, entrepreneurs and small businesses.

He added that technology should complement, rather than replace, traditional lending practices by giving banks a more comprehensive understanding of borrowers through alternative datasets.

Speaking on the company’s role, Osuchukwu said Mathesis Analytics develops AI-powered credit decisioning and scoring solutions that combine multiple data sources to provide lenders with more robust credit assessments.

According to him, the company has processed more than 40 million credit scores and facilitated over $272 million in credit disbursements across Nigeria.

He maintained that wider adoption of AI-powered credit assessment would help bridge Nigeria’s credit gap by enabling banks to identify creditworthy borrowers who have historically remained outside the formal financial system due to limited data visibility.