Better credit infrastructure. Better economics of lending.
DecAltra starts with a conviction: the infrastructure behind financial
decisions deserves attention alongside the availability of capital
itself.
The economic problem
Financing frictions can interrupt investment and expansion. The Bank
of England’s discussion of
finance and productive investment
emphasises the importance of suitable finance, alongside resilience.
“Taking steps to lower delivery and monitoring costs would be
instrumental in improving the economics of SME lending. SME loans
are typically smaller, more heterogeneous and more labour‑intensive
to assess, which raises operating costs per‑loan and depresses
returns. Investment in digitalisation, automation and data‑driven
credit processes can materially reduce these costs by streamlining
underwriting, improving risk assessment, and enabling more efficient
ongoing monitoring.”
Manning, Babu, Bourdais & Włodarski · Bank of England · 19 June
2026What drives differences in commercial banks’ product level
returns? ↗ Lower costs, stronger decision infrastructure
The Bank’s
analysis of lending returns
identifies operating costs as one contributor to lower SME lending profitability.
Its estimates depend on cost-allocation assumptions and do not describe
every bank’s experience.
Banca d’Italia’s study of lending during the pandemic
found that more digitalised banks expanded credit more, particularly
to smaller, financially sounder firms. Its crisis setting matters; we
see it as supporting context for the role of technology in lending
capacity.
The information problem
The
review of high-growth firms
highlights the role of information and relationships in financing. Understanding
a business involves context as well as numbers.
Why we are building Credit Decisioning Infrastructure
Our reading is that the work required to deliver and monitor credit is
an economic constraint worth addressing. This is central to
DecAltra’s reason for existing.
DecAltra’s Credit Decisioning Infrastructure is designed to
connect financial spreading, analysis, credit memoranda, and portfolio
oversight. Our aim is to reduce repeated preparation and fragmented
handovers while preserving the evidence behind each decision.
For credit teams, that means a workflow built around three priorities:
Less repeated work: carry information and analysis through
the assessment process.
Clearer review: keep sources, adjustments, and assumptions
connected to the conclusions professionals assess.
Continuity into monitoring: connect the assessment of
a borrower with the portfolio view and the next action.
Our vision
We want to help financial institutions make sound credit decisions
more efficiently, so that the cost of understanding and monitoring a
business becomes less of a barrier to serving it.
Help suitable capital reach productive opportunities sooner.
The research strengthens the economic rationale for this ambition. The
outcomes of using DecAltra must be established in practice, through
measures such as preparation time, review effort, and monitoring
workload.
Explore DecAltra’s Credit Decisioning Infrastructure ↗
Written by DecAltra, drawing on the research referenced below.
Interpretations and conclusions are our own.
Research references
Colm Manning, Prashant Babu, Ben Bourdais and Robert Włodarski.
What drives differences in commercial banks’ product level
returns?
Bank of England, Bank Insights, 19 June 2026.
Sarah Breeden and Colm Manning.
Finance, growth and productive investment: what is the FPC
assessing in 2026?
Bank of England, Bank Insights, 22 September 2026.
Bank of England.
Unlocking growth: what can the literature tell us about
what’s holding back high-growth firms?
Bank Overground, 2 October 2025. Prepared with the help of Sudipto Karmakar
and Isabelle Roland.
Nicola Branzoli, Edoardo Rainone and Ilaria Supino.
The role of banks’ technology adoption in credit markets
during the pandemic.
Banca d’Italia, Working Paper 1406, March 2023.