Throughout the global credit reporting industry, the American credit reporting industry has gone through more than 100 years, from decentralized to centralized institutions, from basic to diversified services, and from domestic to global markets, and gradually formed a complete industrial system and a highly developed market, with the largest market scale in the world, which has become a key link in the American social credit system and promoted the continuous development of social economy.
A wise man corrects his own mistakes through the mistakes of others.
Recently, Love Analysis will launch a series of research reports, taking the American credit reporting market as a benchmark, and conduct in-depth research on global credit reporting giants such as Yibaili, Equifax and TransUnion. And explore the driving force and reasons why the American credit information market has become a towering tree; At the same time, the innovative models in the market, such as Credit Karma, ZestFinance and other companies, are investigated and analyzed to reveal the innovative trend of credit reporting business in the US market.
Investigate and analyze the American market, so as to better judge the credit information market in China. At present, China's credit information market is in its infancy. So far, there are no giants, a stable pattern has not been formed, and various innovation opportunities are emerging one after another. For the possible market structure and innovation trend in the future, the American credit information market will become its best benchmark, from which we can learn useful experience.
As the first article in this series, this paper will analyze the reasons and characteristics of the highly developed credit reporting industry in the United States from three aspects: development history, current market structure and industry advantages.
The Development Course of American Credit Information Industry
At present, the credit information industry in the United States has formed a mature and complete operation mode, legal system and supervision mechanism, and its development has roughly experienced five stages: germination, rapid development, legal perfection, merger and integration, and stable development.
The initial stage of germination is from the end of 19 to the end of 1920s. This period is the primary stage of the development of American capital market, and a large number of industrial developments have attracted many investors, resulting in the market demand for corporate credit reporting. 184 1 year, Lewis Daban registered the first credit reporting company in the United States, and gradually developed into the most influential company in the field of corporate credit reporting-Dunbar Group.
In addition, consumer credit has also quietly emerged. 1860 the first American personal credit reporting agency was established in Brooklyn, new york, USA. During this period, the characteristics of American credit information industry were non-profit, and retailers were the main credit subjects.
The period of rapid development was from 1930s to the end of 1960s. In 1930s, the first world economic crisis broke out on a large scale, and the rate of credit default kept rising. In order to control the credit risk, the US government has formulated a series of policies to guide and promote the emergence of credit reporting agencies.
After World War II, American economy continued to grow rapidly, residents' consumption level improved, credit demand increased, retail service credit developed rapidly, and consumer credit began to enter thousands of households. The combination of these factors has promoted the rapid development of the credit information market. At this stage, credit reporting agencies begin to charge fees, but from the perspective of the market, most of them are regional companies.
The period of legal perfection was from 1970s to early 1980s. This period is the most important period of American credit information industry, and 17 laws have been promulgated successively, which have comprehensively legislated the credit information demanders, credit granting parties, consumers and the industry itself, formed a legal system with the Fair Credit Information Act as the core, and laid a solid foundation for the healthy development of the credit information market.
At the same time, due to the continuous development of credit cards, bank card alliances such as VISA and MasterCard have been born one after another, and national financial institutions have gradually emerged, which has promoted the development of consumer credit, created a huge demand for personal information selection, and injected a strong impetus into the explosive growth of the credit reporting industry.
The period from 1980s to the end of 20th century was the period of merger and integration. At the end of 1960s, the number of American credit investigation companies reached 2,200. Later, driven by external forces such as the rise of Internet information technology and the large-scale integration of national banks, the credit information industry entered a cruel period of reshuffle and integration, and small-scale or regional companies became the targets of mergers and acquisitions, and the number gradually decreased to about 400 at present, and the number decreased by 82% in 45 years, and national credit information giants gradually appeared.
Trans Union, as a typical representative, began to provide personal credit information service on 1988. After acquiring 40 local credit information bureaus, it gradually became one of the three major credit information giants in the United States. According to the data of American Service Industry Census 1997, the total income of the four major credit reporting agencies accounts for more than 50% of the total income of the whole industry.
The period of stable development is 2 1 early century. The personal credit information market in the United States has formed a stable pattern of Experian, Equifax and Trans Union. Small credit agencies all over the country rely on the three giants to carry out their business, while the corporate credit market is dominated by Dun&; Bradstreet has complete control of the situation.
During this period, American credit reporting industry was characterized by specialization and globalization, and its business was expanding continuously. Instead of just relying on providing credit inquiry service to obtain income, we should innovate products, enrich product lines, provide diversified value-added services and open up more credit applications. At the same time, accelerate the expansion of overseas markets, actively carry out overseas layout, and gradually occupy an important position in the global credit information field.
Throughout the development history of American credit reporting industry 100, the development of information technology, the demand for consumer credit, the appearance of credit cards, the expansion of financial institutions and the improvement of laws have promoted the rapid development of American credit reporting market. At the same time, it can be seen that its development model is completely bottom-up, from the free growth and endless emergence of credit reporting agencies to mergers and acquisitions, the emergence of giants. The whole process is purely market-oriented operation, and the government does not participate in it, but only conducts market coordination and legislative enforcement activities.
The Market Structure of American Credit Information Industry
The credit reporting industry in the United States is highly concentrated, and a mature and professional credit reporting system has been established, which has spawned giant companies that occupy a key position in the global market. The American credit information system is divided into institutional credit information and personal credit information. Institutional credit also includes capital market credit and general enterprise credit. Capital market credit institutions include Standard & Poor's, Moody's and Fitch, while general corporate credit institutions include Dun&; Bradstreet (Deng Bai)
Experian, Equifax and Trans Union are the core in the personal credit reporting industry. The three major credit reporting agencies have both cooperation and competition by virtue of product differences. The remaining 400 regional or professional institutions are affiliated with or provide data to these institutions. 1980 or so, these three personal credit giants have completed the full coverage of American adults.
Among the three personal credit giants:
From the perspective of market size, Yibaili has the largest revenue scale and the widest coverage;
In terms of information sources, Equifax has the most extensive information sources, including not only financial institutions, but also mortgages, consumers and employers.
In terms of business layout, Experian and TransUnion have begun to lay out overseas business, and the domestic and foreign business is almost equally divided, while Equifax is still concentrated in the United States;
In terms of business advantages, Experian is better at data processing and analysis, Equifax has more products, which can evaluate the credit of consumers without credit, while TransUnion has more advantages in risk management.
The mature credit system in the United States not only ensures the healthy development of the whole social economy, but also contributes a huge amount of economic income. The operating income of four companies, Experian, Equifax, TransUnion and Dun & ampBradstree, accounts for 70% of the US credit information market. Combined with the financial reports of these four companies in 20 15, the total income of these four companies from the United States in 20 15 was about 40 billion yuan, which can be estimated to be about 60 billion yuan in the domestic credit information market.
In addition to giant companies, in recent years, internet startups have sprung up like mushrooms after rain, gradually emerging in a highly concentrated market and positioning themselves professionally. Among them, Credit Karma and ZestFinance are typical representatives.
Credit Karma was founded in 2008. Different from the inquiry methods of charging users by the three major companies, the company provides users with free credit reports and online credit score inquiry services to help users find the most cost-effective financial products such as credit cards and general loans, and make profits through the sharing of financial institutions.
At present, the company has about 32 million users, and in the five years from 2009 to 2065438+04, it achieved 40 times revenue growth. At the same time, in 20 14, we obtained a series C financing of $85 million led by Google Capital, with a total financing amount of $65438+170,000.
ZestFinance was originally named ZestCash and was founded in 2009. The core competitiveness of the company lies in the ability of data mining and model development. He is good at using 10 forecasting analysis model to quickly analyze tens of thousands of original information data and get the final consumer credit score. At present, the company only provides services for 654.38+million, the scale is not large, and the actual effect is still difficult to draw conclusions.
20 13 In July, ZestFinance received a series C financing of USD 20 million led by peter thiel, with a total financing amount of USD 65,438+120,000. At the same time, in 20 15, JD.COM invested and the two sides established a joint venture company named JD-ZestFinanceGaia, and its credit model will be applied to the consumer finance system of Jingdong Finance.
Industrial chain of American credit information industry
The industrial chain of American credit industry has also developed to a perfect stage, which mainly includes four links: data collection, data processing, product formation and product application, among which data processing and product formation are the key links.
In terms of data collection, there are four main data sources: financial and retail institutions provide them free of charge; After the data of the public department is handed over to a third-party data processing company for simple processing, a certain fee is charged; Information sharing and charging between credit reporting companies; Take the initiative to investigate and collect from relevant enterprises or individuals, and bear the corresponding expenses.
In data processing, personal data pairing processing, characteristic variables and database technology are used to filter, transform, process and clean the data. At the same time, the American Association of Credit Reference Agencies has formulated the unified standard data reporting and collection formats for personal credit reference business-Metro1and Metro2, which stipulate that any enterprise should provide information in a unified and standardized format.
Form product links, establish a scoring model based on data processing, and form credit scoring products, credit report and other products. For example, Experian generates about 500,000 credit decisions every day.
The product application link is to apply data and products to various scenarios, such as handling loan business and renting houses. The main customers include financial institutions, credit institutions, public institutions, employers, enterprises and individuals.
American credit information industry is highly market-oriented.
In the American credit reporting industry, both personal credit reporting and corporate credit reporting adopt a market-oriented operation mode, and the government is only responsible for supervision according to law. It is based on this model that the American credit reporting industry is very dynamic, forming a mature credit reporting system and having the largest market scale in the world.
The American credit information market operates in full accordance with the principle of marketization. Credit information companies in the United States are all privately founded, directly participating in market competition and aiming at profit. Therefore, American credit bureaus need to pay fees to information providers for obtaining information, and information users need to pay fees to credit bureaus for using information.
Take Experian as an example. In 20 15 years, its global total income reached 4.8 48. 10/0 billion US dollars, and its net profit was about 654,380+0.306 billion US dollars. If 3.8 million credit reports are generated every day, the number of reports provided in the whole year is about 654.38+38 million. If the fee for each report is about $ 654.38+0.7, the annual income from credit services is about $2.35 billion, accounting for about half of the total income.
American credit information service covers all walks of life. American credit reporting agencies pay attention to the diversification and richness of products, and extensively explore the customer field, which is no longer limited to the financial industry. Specifically, it not only provides basic credit services such as credit report and credit score to the financial industry, but also provides credit derivative services such as marketing, decision analysis, human resources and business information platforms to other industries such as government, education, medical care, insurance and telecommunications.
At present, the income of American credit reporting agencies from traditional financial industries accounts for less than 50%. According to the 20 15 annual report of Yibaili, financial institutions contributed US$ 654.38+044 billion, accounting for 30% of its total annual income. At the same time, in its income structure, the income from basic credit information service accounts for 49%, and the income from credit derivative service accounts for 565,438+0%, which is basically the same.
In China, most of the customers of credit reporting agencies still come from the financial industry at this stage, and the services provided also focus on basic credit reporting services, which can further enrich the big data credit reporting scenarios in the future.
The United States adopts FICO scoring system to establish a unified quantitative standard for personal credit. FICO scoring system was invented by Fair Isaac. At present, the three major credit reporting agencies in the United States use FICO scoring system to quantify personal credit quality and risk.
FICO model consists of five parts, including user payment records, number of credit accounts, credit history cycle, newly opened accounts and credit products used, and each part accounts for 35%, 30%, 65,438+05%, 65,438+00% and 65,438+00% respectively in the calculation score. FICO's credit score ranges from 300 to 850. The higher the score, the smaller the credit risk of users.
Protecting personal privacy is balanced with credit information service. 1970 passed the Fair Credit Information Act, which is the core law to regulate personal credit information activities in the United States. It not only stipulates that credit reporting agencies can legally obtain information, but also protects consumers' privacy to the maximum extent. In addition, users of credit reports, such as credit lending institutions, insurance institutions or employers, must inform the parties and the source of this credit report when denying or rejecting the parties based on the credit report, so that consumers can complain about the incorrect and incomplete parts of the report.
In a word, with the development of 100 years, American credit information industry has grown into a towering tree in the credit information industry. In the next issue, Love Analysis will deeply analyze the business model of the global credit giant Yibaili. In the final issue, we will provide a download link for the complete integration report. Please pay attention to readers.