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CPayant Deploys Seekr’s Explainable AI Credit Scoring to tackle the Trade-Finance Blockade Facing African Importers and Exporters
Seekr enables faster, “insight-driven” scoring, with explainability and auditability, resulting in over 75% of applicants approved for financing in days.
RESTON, VA., November 3, 2026 — Seekr, the leader in explainable, sovereign AI, today announced that CPayant, a US headquartered digital trade banking platform for African importers and exporters, has deployed an AI credit-scoring system built on SeekrFlow™. The system does what the trade-finance establishment has been constrained to do for decades. It shows financing partners exactly why a business is creditworthy, and it shows every business exactly why it scored the way it did, and what would move the number.
The results
Since CPayant began presenting AI-scored credit profiles to its financing partners, over 75% of the African businesses that applied have been approved for financing. A clear profile changes the size of the approval, not just the odds of getting one. In one early case, a CPayant client applied for a $250,000 import credit line. On the strength of his profile, he qualified for a $1.2 million revolving credit line.
The problem was never risk. It was opacity. Across Africa, banks approve only 63% of trade-finance applications from small businesses, against 80% for applications overall. The reason they cite most often is that they cannot establish the applicant’s creditworthiness. The African Development Bank says that finding has not changed since it began tracking the market in 2014. Twelve years. The same answer. The cost is a trade-finance gap of roughly $74 billion, carried mostly by small businesses. Yet the African Development Bank reports their default rates have held steady at roughly 8% to 10%. That is not unknowable risk.
Analysis and decision, separated
Most AI in finance asks institutions to trust a black box. CPayant refused to build one. Its system divides the work. AI agents gather and prepare each business’s transaction, volume and repayment data. A transparent scoring engine, built around factors CPayant itself defined, makes the call.
Because the score comes from that purpose-built, fine-tuned engine rather than a broad, generic model, every factor’s contribution can be shown, reviewed and challenged. Every business receives specific recommendations on what would improve its creditworthiness. And where many banks penalize early repayment, CPayant rewards it.
“When I worked in banking, a credit decision could turn on who your relationship manager was and whether the committee liked your business. That is not a system. That is a lottery,” said Emmanuel Tokunbo Darko, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of CPayant. “Here, the numbers speak true. Every business is scored on the same factors: how often it transacts, the volumes it moves, how it repays. And it can see exactly why it scored the way it did. Most cross-border platforms move the money and take a fee. We get businesses the financing to grow. With Seekr, we built the scoring ourselves rather than accepting someone else’s model.”
“A credit financing partner doesn’t fund a number. It funds a reason,” said Lloyd Cope, Chief Revenue Officer at Seekr. “AI that cannot explain itself has no place in decisions that determine whether a business survives. CPayant built its scoring so the reason arrives with every score. A financing partner can approve with conviction, and a business that is turned down knows exactly what to fix.”
The architecture consequential decisions demand
CPayant is now extending explainable, AI-scored credit profiles across its pipeline of trade-financing clients. The system reflects the principle Seekr applies in every regulated environment it serves. AI agents orchestrate the process. A transparent, purpose-built decision layer makes the call. Every output can be traced, explained, defended, contested and audited. Anything less should not be trusted with decisions this important.
About CPayant
CPayant is a digital trade banking platform for African businesses that import and export. Beyond cross-border payments, multi-currency accounts, invoicing and trade documentation, CPayant uses its proprietary AI credit-scoring system to connect businesses with trade financing, including letters of credit, bank guarantees, and import and export credit lines, through its financing partners. CPayant is headquartered in Delaware, USA. Learn more at cpayant.com.
About Seekr
Seekr is the leader in explainable, defensible AI built for critical decisions in environments that demand accuracy and accountability. Seekr’s technology and products help enterprises and government agencies develop and deploy domain-specific large language models (LLMs), vision language models (VLMs) that understand the physical world, edge-based systems and AI agents across any infrastructure, including sovereign deployments. Backed by robust verification and validation tools that surface the provenance, lineage and intent behind every model decision, Seekr delivers AI that organizations can audit and trust across all modalities. Learn more at seekr.com.
Media contact: PR@seekr.com
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