Before 2019, Sibos made its last appearance in the UK in Brighton, 1985. So, what was the world like in 1985? TFG’s Ross McKenzie reports on the trade themes of Sibos 2019.

financial crime risk, just like any other risk, can be better understood using data and modelling techniques, instead of common wisdom. TFG heard from Sihem Mouelhi at Elucidate to find out more.

Five years ago, if you asked a global investor how they viewed the Middle East, two prominent factors would probably have immediately sprung to mind. Oil and real estate, the latter most obviously in Dubai. What’s changed? TFG spoke to Emma Parsons, Bahrain EDB’s Regional Director for the UK and Ireland about the role of technology within global trade in the MENA region.

Anders la Cour, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Banking Circle looks at the challenges and opportunities ahead for financial institutions serving SMEs.

One of the global trends is that the net-positive gains from financial integration is quite uneven. Like many parts of the world, ASEAN is facing multiple global challenges under a “VUCA” environment; being volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous.

Standard identifiers are playing an increasingly important role in finance and trade globally. TFG’s Deepesh Patel heard from Richard Young at FIGI (Bloomberg).

In Global Financial Integrity’s 2019 update “Illicit Financial Flows to and from 148 Developing Countries 2006 – 2015” the estimate of illicit outflows of trade related payments from developing economies for 2015 alone was counted in the hundreds of billions – greater in value in fact than the aid budgets flowing into those countries.

The global trading system is in disarray. Global economic growth is slowing, half the G20 are now operating under openly protectionist agendas, and tensions between China and the United States remain high – despite faint promise of a truce earlier this year. But over in the UK, all of this is overshadowed by the continuing dispute over Brexit. The nation is bitterly divided, and we are fast approaching what could constitute a national crisis.

Over the past few weeks, trade spats have shaken global markets. Worldwide, trade conflicts are being borne of political rather than economic woes — is this the new normal?

There is, so far as I am aware, little or no precedent for what the UK is attempting to do: seeking to reduce unfettered access to its closest and most important market – which also happens to be one of the world’s two largest. In 2018, 46% of the UK’s exports went to the EU, and 54% of UK imports came from it. Almost all countries in the world try to make trade deals, not dismantle them.