Your Monday morning coffee briefing from TFG. UK prepares for roadmap out of lockdown. Japanese economy sees 3 percent growth compared with last quarter. HSBC set to move top brass out of Canary Wharf in a pivot towards Asia.
SEB and Wärtsilä trial digital letters of credit
A joint Scandinavian venture has trialled digital Export Letters of Credit (LCs) as part of a secure data sharing experiment. The experiment hopes to show that corporate data sharing can be executed functionally and without the fear of critical business information being misused. Read more →
Singapore paves path towards trade digitalisation
Singapore has taken a major step forward for trade digitalisation by becoming just the second country to adopt the UNCITRAL Model Law on Electronic Transferable Records (MLETR) into legislation. Read more →
UK Export Finance guarantee £200 million Taiwanese wind farm
The UK’s export credit agency is providing a £200 million buyer credit guarantee to help finance an offshore wind farm in Taiwan. It will be the third project financed by the UK since 2019, in a bid to create green jobs for UK renewable energy companies. Read more →
VIDEO: ICC DSI’s five year standardisation plan
Trade Finance Talks host Deepesh Patel sat down with the Managing Director of newly established ICC Digital Standards Initiative, Oswald Kuyler, to discuss their roadmap for 2021 and beyond. Read more →
Belarusian violence drives four fold increase in EU sanctions
The European Union quadrupled global sanctions in 2020, according to new data from Accuity. This was driven in part by state violence in Belarus, where authorities responded violently to protests against the re-election of Alexander Lukashenko Read more→
Building bridges and blockchains: GTR MENA 2021 Roundup
Get all the insights from last week’s GTR Virtual MENA, one of the longest established trade finance conferences in the region with a host of regional experts. Read more →
More than half of UK firms plan to hire new staff
56% of 2,000 firms surveyed planned to hire in the first three months of 2021.The human resources body, the CIPD, said it was the first positive signs for employment prospects it had seen in a year. Read more →
Why we need to stop talking about Bitcoin
DLT’s substantial progress in this field has been vastly overshadowed by the hype surrounding Bitcoin’s market cap. We need to stop talking about Musk’s investment in BTC and start talking about breakthroughs in DLT in trade, says Deepesh Patel. Read more →
HSBC move top brass out of Canary Wharf in Asia pivot
HSBC will accelerate plans to increase its presence in Asia, as the bank prepares to shift some of its senior executives from London to Hong Kong, according to media reports Read more →
