Definition
Cash flow underwriting assesses creditworthiness from consumer-permissioned bank account data — income, spending, and bill payment patterns — rather than relying solely on traditional credit bureau files.
Key Points
- Millions of US adults lack sufficient traditional credit history; cash flow data provides alternative signals (2026-10-06-plaid-credit-fraud-payment-risk-ai)
- plaid Instant Link enables one-time consent for future lending decisions with sub-2-second lender access
- Sequential transaction modeling (order, timing, interactions) adds predictive lift beyond aggregated cash-flow summaries