During the last academic year, the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration and the Credit risk model validation team of KBC Group Branch Bulgaria carried out a number of joint educational initiatives in the field of artificial intelligence. The partnership between the two institutions continues to expand and deepen.

In another such successfully accomplished initiative, Credit risk model validation team of KBC Group Branch Bulgaria provided four different case studies assignments backed up with real data for the master's program “AI for Business and Finance” in the field of credit risk modelling. Students taking the course “Advanced Probability and Statistics” had the opportunity to deliver teamwork solutions on the assigned case studies with the following topics:

• Representativeness analyses: Data exploration and visualization, Data analysis;
• Testing the accuracy of the model predicted values, hypothesis testing;
• Assessment of the predictive ability of the model and ensuring the model provides meaningful differentiation of risk and accurate and consistent quantitative estimates of risk for clients with high exposures;
• Analysis of theoretical paradoxical situation, related to assessing the predictive ability of the model.

During the semester the Credit risk model validation team presented to FEBA students an overview of credit risk modelling and validation framework and carried out a sequence of meetings with Prof. DSc. Chobanov to define four different assignments in line with the syllabus of the course “Advanced Probability and Statistics”.

At the end of the course each team presented their solution to Prof. DSc. Chobanov (Head of the course), Assoc. Prof. Dr. Boryana Bogdanova (Head of master's program “AI for Business and Finance") and the Credit risk model validation team of KBC Group Branch Bulgaria. For their projects students used R and Python programing languages. Dr. Irem Yaman (Head of the Credit risk model validation team), Mihaela Angelova, Veselin Mitrov, Vilizar Goshev, Mitko Tanev, Gabriela Miteva, Zhivko Todorov, Ivanina Ivanova and Petar Damyanov gave feedback and recommendations to all the students.

The management of the maser's program “AI for Business and Finance” expresses their gratitude to Dr. Irem Yaman and to the entire team of Credit risk validation for their invaluable support in the development of the master's program “AI for Business and Finance”.