Experian PLC

Fair Isaac shares fell 7% after hours Thursday and TransUnion dropped 6% following a Bloomberg report that the Federal Housing Finance Agency plans to direct Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to require lenders to pull credit data from two major credit reporting bureaus instead of three. The requirement could be announced as soon as Oct. 12, when FHFA Director Bill Pulte is scheduled to speak at a mortgage industry conference in Chicago, according to a person familiar with the plans cited by Bloomberg. The move would mark another significant change for an industry already under pressure from Pulte, who has repeatedly called for lower credit-reporting and scoring costs in the mortgage market and said on Sept. 3 that the agency was seriously considering bi-merge. It adds to a brutal stretch for FICO, whose shares plunged nearly 49% in September, including a 27% drop on Sept. 29, after FHFA put VantageScore, FICO's main rival, on the same mortgage-pricing grid as the traditional FICO Classic score. Three companies, Equifax, Experian Plc and TransUnion, dominate the credit-reporting industry and jointly own VantageScore, and mortgage lenders have traditionally used a tri-merge report combining credit data from all three bureaus, so the reported change represents a potential double hit: greater competition for FICO in mortgage scoring and lower demand for the bureaus' traditional three-bureau reports.

Two student loan borrowers have sued the U.S. Department of Education, alleging that federal loans the department canceled continue to appear as outstanding debt on their credit reports. The proposed class-action lawsuit was filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and seeks damages under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, with the borrowers claiming the department still reports the canceled loans to Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, according to case materials from the Project on Predatory Student Lending. PPSL noted that from April 2022 through January 2025, the Department of Education announced final group discharges covering more than 1.5 million borrowers and $23.4 billion in federal student loans tied to schools where the department found widespread fraud and misconduct, and it estimates that $4.6 billion of that canceled debt is still being reported to credit bureaus, affecting more than 300,000 people. Mandy Woods, who borrowed about $65,000 to attend Ashford University, said her credit reports showed a $71,901 balance as of August 2026, while Jorge Cortes, a Marine Corps veteran who borrowed to attend ITT Technical Institute, said his reports still showed a $21,586 balance in August 2026 despite his loans being included in the department's August 2022 group discharge. The lawsuit says the FCRA requires companies that furnish information to credit bureaus to investigate disputed information and correct or delete information that is inaccurate, incomplete, or cannot be verified, and the Department of Education did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Fair Isaac Corporation (FICO) shares fell 15.63% intraday after Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte directed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to approve all lenders to use VantageScore, effective immediately, ending a pilot that had been capped at 50 lenders. "FICO has enjoyed a monopoly. No more," Pulte said. Equifax shares dropped 6.65% and TransUnion 6.83%. The move expands on an April pilot where the two government-sponsored enterprises began accepting mortgages scored with VantageScore 4.0. FICO shares are down more than 44% year to date. Pulte also criticized the three credit reporting agencies that own VantageScore—Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion—for overcharging Americans, and said the agency is considering bi-merge and stronger solutions. VantageScore, founded in 2006, is jointly owned by the three agencies. The Trump administration aims to lower homebuyer costs and boost competition in a market FICO dominates, building on the Credit Score Competition Act signed in 2018.

TransUnion is benefiting from the rapidly expanding big data and analytics market, driven by strong demand for data-backed business insights. The company reported first-quarter 2026 adjusted earnings of $1.18 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 6.3% and rising 12.4% year over year, while revenues of $1.25 billion exceeded estimates by 3.1% and grew 13.7%. TransUnion continues to leverage its OneTru platform to launch new products and enhance analytics, and in March 2026 it acquired approximately 94% of Trans Union de Mexico to expand in the Mexican market. However, the company faces significant competition from firms like Equifax, Experian, and LexisNexis, which may limit pricing power and profitability, and it carries elevated debt from past acquisitions. TransUnion's current ratio of 1.93 at the end of the first quarter indicates strong liquidity, but seasonal patterns in its U.S. and international segments create forecasting challenges.

A record 19% of new car buyers in the second quarter of 2025 took on monthly payments of $1,000 or more, up from under 7% three years earlier, according to Edmunds. The average new car payment reached $767 in the fourth quarter of 2025, with average loan amounts of $43,582 over 68.9 months, per Experian. Subprime auto loan delinquencies hit a 32-year high of 6.9% in January 2026, while total outstanding auto debt climbed to $1.667 trillion. Real average hourly earnings slipped to $11.24 in May 2026, and the personal savings rate fell to 3.7%, squeezing household budgets. The University of Michigan consumer sentiment index dropped to 49.8 in April 2026, signaling growing financial strain.

Aoris Investment Management reported that its Aoris International Fund significantly underperformed its benchmark in the first quarter of 2026, partly due to sharp declines in stocks exposed to AI disruption concerns, including Accenture plc. The fund's Class A (Unhedged) returned negative 13.7% after fees, underperforming its benchmark by 7.8%, while the Class C (Hedged) dropped 10.1%, trailing by 7.3%. Accenture, a professional services company, was among the leading detractors, with its shares losing 58.49% over the past 52 weeks and closing at $124.83 on June 22, 2026. Aoris noted that investor worries about AI displacing white-collar workers and commoditizing software and data contributed to declines in five portfolio holdings, including Microsoft, SAP, Experian, RELX, and Accenture, collectively shaving 9.4% from performance. Despite the sell-off, Aoris highlighted Accenture's evolution into a critical partner for cloud migration, cybersecurity, and AI implementation, suggesting its current oversold status may offer an entry point for dividend investors.

Aoris Investment Management highlighted RELX PLC as one of five portfolio companies whose shares fell sharply in the first quarter of 2026 due to investor worries about artificial intelligence. The fund noted that RELX, along with Microsoft, SAP, Experian, and Accenture, collectively dragged performance down by 9.4% as markets questioned whether AI would commoditize data and software. Aoris argued that RELX is protected because its proprietary databases—such as the one used by US car insurers for underwriting—are not available to AI models. RELX stock closed at $30.83 on June 22, 2026, with a one-month return of negative 6.29% and a 52-week decline of 42.17%, giving it a market capitalization of $54.14 billion.