ATLANTA -

Before arriving at Equifax, both Lou Loquasto and Craig Sims spent time in the industry trenches with auto finance companies, competing against other providers for applications and contracts generated at dealerships.

When Loquasto and Sims offered the industry media a glimpse of Equifax’s newest tool — TradeSight — the availability of this marketplace intelligence platform made them both harken back to how it could have made their tenure with finance companies even more fruitful.

Combining Equifax consumer credit information with dealer and vehicle data from third-party sources, TradeSight can enable auto finance companies to assess their dealer network, benchmark against their peers and better understand a dealer’s commercial risk.

“In all the years I’ve been in auto finance, this is the most excited I’ve been about a product,” said Loquasto, Equifax’s vice president. “It has to do with dealer risk, helping lenders in what is a very competitive environment.

“We took that track that when we were lenders, what did we want as far as a dealer and business intelligence tool? That’s what we produced,” he continued during that sneak peek of the tool that officially launched on Wednesday.

It took Equifax nearly two years to develop the tool in response to finance companies’ need to assess opportunities within a sector that is increasingly competitive, particularly with the emergence of nontraditional financing providers.

Leveraging data from industry leaders such as Black Book and IHS Automotive, TradeSight can provide comprehensive analytics from a single platform that can uniquely provide market insights into contract-level analysis. This analysis can enable lenders to adjust terms offered to consumers to track dealer performance in support of portfolio growth.

 Offering data on the last 48 months of originations and providing regular updates, TradeSight is designed to help finance companies assess:

—Percentage of loans being directed to them from certain dealerships

—Types of loans most and least frequently initiated at those dealerships

—Current and historical loan performance

—Positive and negative selection among their dealer network

—Commercial risks of each dealership

Sims, the Equifax auto lending sales leader, explained the tool capabilities this way: “Am I the first choice lender or am I the last choice lender? Am I getting the best deals or am I getting the worst deals? Now lenders will be able to see that performance within a single dealership or dealer group.”

Loquasto added that finance companies will be able to see if a top competitor “is getting aggressive with this (specific) dealership. Then I need to spend more time with this dealership. We may need to do something because I need to compete with the other folks.”

Sims insisted TradeSight was built to evolve with the needs of the auto finance industry, and Equifax plans to continue to incorporate more data sources into the platform over time. Along with this pledge, Sims mentioned finance companies have the option of directly accessing the market intelligence tool or requesting customized reports based on their individual needs. He added this customized approach will enable them to acquire the specific data they need to manage the specific risk that may exist within their dealer network.

Touching on why it took such an effort and collaboration, Sims said, “It just takes a while to pull all of those pieces together to make sure they’re buttoned up and ready for prime time.”

For more information about TradeSight, finance companies and dealerships can contact their Equifax sales representative.

“Automotive lending has long been a highly competitive market and with the industry becoming increasingly more complex, driving an increasing need for more relevant and timely market insights,” Loquasto said in Equifax’s announcement.

“As a result, we recognized an opportunity to incorporate the loan-level data on hand and pair it with some of our industry partners to create TradeSight, which delivers a comprehensive snapshot of the auto lending marketplace,” he went on to say.