GLOSSARY

Vintage curve

A vintage curve groups loans by the year they were made and tracks how each year's cohort performed — separating old problems from current ones.

A single average default rate can hide a lot: a brand that stumbled in 2010 but has been solid since looks the same as one that's deteriorating right now. Grouping loans by approval year (their "vintage") and following each cohort separately shows the direction of travel.

Lenders read risk this way; we borrow the technique so buyers can too. On brand pages, the vintage chart shows whether recent buyers are doing better or worse than earlier ones.