Omnisient wins Money20/20 Bank Grand Prix after grocery data helped 40% of credit-invisible consumers qualify for credit

Working with two major banks and a leading national grocery retailer, the initiative found that 40% of consumers scored now qualify for credit.

LAS VEGAS, NV, UNITED STATES, October 19, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Omnisient has won the Banking Grand Prix at the 2026 Money20/20 Money Awards for using grocery shopping data to help banks assess people with no credit history. Working with two major banks and a leading national grocery retailer, the initiative found that 40% of consumers scored now qualify for credit they would previously have been denied.

The Grand Prix is the highest distinction in the Banking category. Entered under Financial Inclusion, the winning initiative is a data-for-good story: it opened fair access to credit for people the financial system had overlooked.

Millions of Americans face the same barrier - having no credit file, or too little history to generate a score. Many more, including gig economy workers with variable incomes, are assessed on stale or incomplete data. Conventional scores lean heavily on past mortgage, car loan and credit card repayments, so people who have never carried that kind of debt are often overlooked, however responsibly they manage their money.

Omnisient, a UK-headquartered consumer intelligence company backed by TransUnion, is now bringing this approach to U.S. banks as Basket Signals, with the aim of opening the same opportunity to American consumers. The company operates in the U.S., UK, Brazil, the Middle East and South Africa.

Grocery history revealed creditworthiness that credit files missed

“Credit-invisible” consumers have no credit file, or too little history for a conventional score. Many pay their bills and budget carefully every week, yet lenders cannot see it.

In South Africa, where the initiative was first deployed, grocery shopping history allowed banks to score 38% of the country’s credit-invisible population for the first time. Of those newly scored, 40% qualified for credit they would previously have been denied.

In a separate live deployment, one banking partner approved approximately 20% of previously credit-invisible applicants screened through the service over 12 months. Banks retained responsibility for credit policy and final lending decisions.

Seeing people the system overlooks

“A credit file captures only a fraction of someone’s financial life,” said Jon Jacobson, CEO and co-founder of Omnisient. “Almost everyone buys groceries, every week, for years. When you read those patterns carefully, you find creditworthy people who were simply invisible to the system.”

“Credit invisibility isn’t a regional problem. Millions of Americans, from gig workers to young adults starting out, manage their money responsibly, yet their bank knows surprisingly little about them,” said Imran Bhatti, Chief Revenue Officer, North America, at Omnisient. “With Basket Signals, U.S. banks can see the purchasing power and changing needs behind a transaction, and find good customers their competitors are overlooking.”

What a $150 grocery bill doesn’t tell a bank

A bank may know a customer spent $150 at a retailer. But what does that transaction reveal about their purchasing power or changing needs?

Basket Signals answers that question. It adds intelligence derived from the products and brands people buy, the prices they pay, and how their shopping changes over years. It complements account, transaction and open banking data, and analyzes repeated behavior rather than drawing conclusions from any single purchase.

Basket Signals brings together three types of intelligence:
1) Affluence Score helps identify purchasing power and capacity to save and invest, supporting deposit acquisition and deeper existing relationships.
2) Basket Score informs assessments of financial capacity and repayment risk, including a second look for consumers with limited or outdated credit histories.
3) Life Stage Indicator helps banks recognize changes in behavior that may signal evolving financial needs.

For example, a customer with a modest balance at one bank may show sustained purchasing power in their shopping history. That can prompt the bank to explore the customer’s savings and investment needs.

Banks do not need to build their own models to get started. Omnisient advises on the data needed for each use case and handles matching and analysis. Signals can feed marketing audiences or flow through APIs into existing bank systems to inform digital and in-branch conversations.

Banks never see shopping receipts or consumer identities

Personal identifiers are protected before analysis, and raw customer data is never exchanged between banks and retailers. Participating retailers keep control of their underlying data, while banks remain responsible for governance and lending decisions. Omnisient is ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certified.

For a full list of Money 20/20 Awards winners, visit: https://winners.money2020.com/entries/117

About Omnisient

Omnisient is a consumer intelligence company that helps financial institutions understand their customers through retailer-permissioned shopping intelligence. Founded in South Africa and headquartered in the UK, Omnisient operates across South Africa, the U.S., the UK, Brazil and the Middle East.

The company is backed by TransUnion, a strategic partner and minority investor, and is ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certified. Omnisient has been recognized as a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer, one of CNBC’s World’s Top Fintech Companies, and a Finovate Award winner for Financial Inclusion.

Learn more at www.omnisient.com.

Julian Diaz
Omnisient
+1 201-892-6127
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