Introduction
Data management in asset based finance is rarely straightforward. One servicer delivers loan tapes via SFTP with date-stamped filenames that change every month. Another counterparty stores collateral data in an S3 bucket organized by vintage. Internal teams may run core reporting flows through Snowflake or Trino. Across a portfolio of transactions, you end up dealing with multiple delivery methods at once.
The traditional answer is manual work: download, rename, upload, reconcile, repeat. It doesn’t scale – and it introduces operational risk in a process that cannot afford uncertainty. Cardo AI replaces that with a retrieval framework that meets each counterparty where they already are and automates everything from that point forward.
Cardo AI Data Platform connects to your data sources natively, on your desired schedule, with full control over how data is matched to each transaction. No middleware. No manual downloads. No data wrangling. No month-end “are we sure this is the right file?” reconciliation.
What Cardo AI delivers
SFTP: The industry standard, fully automated
File transfers remain the backbone of servicer reporting. Cardo AI supports both Cardo-hosted and client/third-party-hosted configurations, so you can work with counterparties without forcing process change.
- Cardo-hosted SFTP: we provision and manage the server, generate credentials, and handle encryption so counterparties simply drop files into a designated folder.
- Third-party-hosted SFTP: we connect directly using password or SSH key authentication, respecting existing security policies.
The platform supports real-world file handling. Filenames with dates, version strings, and variable elements are handled automatically, so a naming convention change doesn’t break the pipeline.
Amazon S3: Cloud-native retrieval with enterprise-grade security
As originators and servicers modernize, more reporting data lives in S3. Cardo AI connects directly to S3 buckets and retrieves files on the same scheduled model as SFTP, with support for folder structures, naming conventions, and encryption.
Security is first-class: support includes standard access keys and STS Assume Role – temporary, scoped credentials without sharing long-lived secrets.
Snowflake: Direct database connectivity (not just data sharing)
Snowflake Data Sharing can be clean in theory, but it comes with practical limits: both parties need to be on Snowflake, retrieval-time filtering/transforms can be constrained, and consumers are exposed to a live view that can change without notice.
Cardo AI’s approach is different: we connect directly to the counterparty database and retrieve data by executing structured queries—selecting the specific fields needed, applying granular filters (portfolio/date/loan status), and pulling only what’s relevant to each transaction.
This enables:
- Right-time retrieval in the reporting cycle, not continuous exposure through a live share.
- Granular scoping so you don’t pull entire warehouse tables when you only need a slice.
- Reference-date alignment so Snowflake extracts are automatically matched to the correct reporting period – consistent with SFTP/S3 sync logic.
Trino: SQL access to distributed data via JDBC
For teams running Trino, Cardo AI connects via JDBC and treats Trino as a first-class data source alongside Snowflake and relational databases – retrieving data with the same field-level selection, filtering logic, and scheduling, without extra exports or data movement.
Data Protection and Privacy: GDPR and US compliance built in
Data tapes often carry personally identifiable information (PII) — borrower names, addresses, social security numbers, and other identifiers embedded in loan tapes and collateral files. Cardo AI addresses this directly: the platform can automatically strip, mask, or pseudonymise identifiers at the field level, in line with GDPR requirements and US privacy frameworks including CCPA and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. This means downstream analytics, reporting, and data sharing workflows operate on de-identified datasets by default, reducing regulatory exposure and simplifying data retention obligations without sacrificing the operational data needed to run each transaction.
Why it matters
In asset based finance, “getting the data” is not a commodity problem. A failed synchronization becomes a delayed report. An incorrectly dated dataset becomes a compliance risk. And the operational consequences compound quickly across transactions and reporting cycles.
Cardo AI’s connectivity layer is designed to remove the manual touchpoints that create these failure modes – while respecting institutional security and governance requirements. When you connect a transaction in Cardo AI Data Platform, you establish a structured, auditable, automated data pipeline that runs on your schedule, produces correctly dated outputs, and holds up when counterparties change filenames.
Outcomes you can expect
- Reduced operational risk from manual handling, missed files, and fragile naming conventions.
- Faster reporting cycles with scheduled, automated retrieval across counterparties and protocols.
- Cleaner governance: scoped access, encryption, and auditable, repeatable data pipelines.
- Consistent period matching via reference-date logic across SFTP, S3, and Snowflake retrievals.
- Built-in privacy compliance: automatic PII removal and de-identification to meet GDPR and US regulatory obligations.
Modernize data retrieval without changing how your counterparties work. Connect your sources, map them to each transaction, and let Cardo AI run the pipeline – securely, on schedule, and audit-ready, every time, without extra work! Book a demo.