This thesis investigates the relationship between tertiary education, Basel knowledge and risk-aversion in credit managers in the market for unsecured loans in Sweden. A survey was made to test these links and the sample of respondents consisted of 30 credit managers. Results showed no obvious effect of tertiary education on risk-aversion, managers ability to contravene the algorithm and the non-occurrence of default. It showed that there may be an effect of the inability to contravene the algorithm on the occurrence of ‘bad business’ and that there may be an effect of acquired tertiary education on Basel knowledge. This implies that not allowing credit managers to contravene algorithms may increase the occurrence of default. The results also imply that banks, credit institutes and regulators should take action towards improving the understanding of the Basel directive and regulations among credit managers.

This study was designed to determine (1) the level of priority that employees of nonprofit counseling agencies affiliated with the National Foundation for Consumer Credit (NFCC) feel the topics of credit, personal finance, investments, counseling, and consumer education should be given on a national certification examination for financial counselors, and (2) to determine the viewpoints of NFCC counselors concerning the format of a national certification examination. Data were collected with a 162-item questionnaire from 281 individuals employed by nonprofit counseling agencies affiliated with the NFCC; this represented an 83% response rate. Respondents were asked to prioritize 138-items on a scale of 1 for low priority to 5 for high priority. The items were distributed unevenly among the five topic areas. The overall mean priority score of all five topic areas was 3.6. Credit and counseling both received the highest individual topic mean priority score of 4.1. / Master of Science

How do experienced lenders make decisions? This dissertation addresses this question by investigating judgment and decision-making behavior of loan officers in banks as well as credit managers in supplying companies. The dissertation applies an integrated economic-psychological perspective and consists of seven parts: a comprehensive literature review and six separate empirical papers. Reviewed areas are research on judgment and decision-making (JDM), research on expert decision-makers, and earlier empirical work on experienced lenders. The six papers shed light on: (1) desirable personal attributes of expert credit analysts; (2) the use of software to track JDM behavior; (3) differences between novices' and experienced loan officers' JDM behavior; (4) the relationships between information acquisition, risk attitude, and experience; (5) attitudes towards credit decision support systems; and (6) attitudes towards requesting collateral. Employed methods were in-depth interviews, a nation-wide survey, and a computer-based experiment.On the whole, the empirical findings give an ambiguous picture of the alleged superiority of experienced lenders' judgment and decision-making behavior. On the one hand, experienced lenders seem to be capable, careful, and conscious of their responsibility. On the other hand, they tend to disagree and make contradictory judgments and decisions. The applied perspective and methodology are not only aimed at providing better insights into how experienced lenders make decisions, but can also stimulate future research on how professionals in other domains than credit granting make decisions. / Diss. Stockholm : Handelshögsk., 2001