In this episode, Hiten Patel and Archie Stebbings welcome Donal Smith, co-founder and chairman of Credit Benchmark, to discuss the role of aggregated credit data in the financial services industry. The conversation covers the evolution of credit ratings, the challenges faced by smaller companies in obtaining credit ratings, and the innovative approach Credit Benchmark takes to provide valuable insights from anonymized data collected from banks.
Donal reflects on his career journey, the impact of data on capital markets, and the importance of persistence in entrepreneurship. He also shares thoughts on the future of data utilization in finance, particularly with the integration of artificial intelligence (AI).