As of February 21, 2018, there were 1,878 million people registered in the database of the BIC (the bureau of information on credit) of the WAEMU zone, said Tiémoko Meyliet Koné, the governor of the BCEAO, during of a conference in Abidjan on March 1 at the invitation of the employers
These data were collected from 148 credit and microfinance institutions subject to the 185 affected by this credit information-sharing system. In detail, these figures concern 17,242 legal persons and 1.86 million natural persons.
Operational since February 2016, the BIC, whose management is entrusted to Creditinfo Volo, was implemented in order to address the problem of asymmetric information between lenders and borrowers in the credit market, one of the main constraints to the development of credit in the WAEMU zone.
Creditinfo Volo collects and exploits credit or credit history data from credit applicants to provide financial institutions with detailed credit reports on borrowers.
It should be noted that, in addition to financial organizations, data is now collected from major billers such as water, electricity and telephone companies.
