This exclusive three-part series training program will highlight operations and processes in the international trade environment, operating examples of various trade finance instruments, the trade payment mechanisms and risk and international payment systems and supply chain finance.
- International Trade Finance - Trade Finance Instruments - PART 1 (2 CPE Credits)
- International Trade Finance - International Trade Payment Instruments - PART 2(1.5 CPE Credits)
- International Trade Finance - International Payment Systems and Supply Chain Finance - Part 3(1.5 CPE Credits)
The first course in the exclusive three-part series will highlight underlying operations and processes in the international trade environment. The course will also highlight differences between pre and post shipment financing and explain the differences between trade finance and trade payments.
The second course will offer a detailed expose of the documentary credit process and will discuss the underlying problems of international trade and the trade payment mechanisms and risk.
The last in the series will focus on international payment systems and supply chain finance. Among other discussions, the course will focus on CLS and its role in settling international trade payments, supply chain finance benefits, operating examples of various trade finance instruments, and more.
Part - 1:
International Trade Finance - Trade Finance Instruments - PART 1
Areas Covered in the Webinar:
- Introduction to Structured Trade Finance
- Using collateral to manage credit risk
- Why structured finance matters
- Trade Finance Instruments
- Typical forms of international trade and commodity finance
- International trade finance and trade payments
- Tools of international trade finance (covering both pre-shipment and post-shipment finance)
- Pre-shipment and post finance instruments (such as bank overdrafts, term loans, credit lines, foreign currency denominated trade facilities, open local or international letters of credit, leasing or hire/purchase arrangements, guarantees) and (such as credit, draft negotiation, discounting, letters of credit, documentary collections)
Part - 2:
International Trade Finance - International Trade Payment Instruments - PART 2
Areas Covered in the Webinar:
- The underlying problems of international trade
- Trade payment mechanisms and risk
- Risks for exporter/seller of the different payment terms
- Payment mechanism choices
- We examine each instrument in depth; what it is, how it works, when one should use it, the advantages and disadvantages of each as well as the risks
- Open account
- Real instrument or just a marketing ploy?
- Payment/ cash in advance
- Disadvantages to the exporter/ seller
- Documentary collections
- The role of banks
- Detailed expose of the documentary collection process including detailed flow charts
- Documentary collection variations
- Documentary credits
- Detailed expose of the documentary credit process including detailed flow charts
- Banks and documentary credits
- Letter of Credit fraud
- Country credit lines
- The role that documents play
- Problems caused by improper documents
- Master agreements and their uses
- Shipper’s Indemnities
- Revolving letter of credit
- Letter of credit costs
- Stand-by letters of credit as a payment instrument
- Documentation
Part - 3:
International Trade Finance - International Payment Systems and Supply Chain Finance - Part 3
Areas Covered in the Webinar:
- International Payment Systems
- How international payments are made
- The purpose of a payment system
- International payments characteristics
- The payment process
- Payments in US dollars – CHIPS
- We explore the CHIPS dollar payment system in terms of its day-to-day operations and settlements
- Correspondent banking
- A survey of correspondent banking, what it is, its operations and how payments are settled
- CLS and its role in settling international trade payments
- Foreign exchange risk
- How CLS operates
- Supply Chain Finance
- Supply chain finance - what it is
- Buyer/ supplier payment dynamics
- Payment terms and risk
- Supply chain finance in international trade
- The challenges of the letter of credit
- Trade settlement risk
- Unbalanced trade terms
- Supply chain finance example
- Benefits
- Funding options
- Funding variations and new developments
- Supply chain finance vs traditional methods
- Pre-export financing
- Inventory financing
- Post-export financing
Who Will Benefit:
- Commercial bankers from front/middle/back offices
- Commercial bankers dealing with the Forex market
- International division bankers
- Trade finance supervisors and managers
- Trading company managers, senior and operations staff
- Trading company, multinational corporate and treasury staff
- Internal and external auditors
- Central bank and monetary authority regulators
- Treasury department employees
- Credit and collection managers
- Company presidents, vice presidents and CFOs
- Sales managers
- Attorneys
- Accountants
- Companies involved in reinsurance, commodities trading, engineering, arranging financing
- Anyone who uses standby letters of credit
- Directors
- Fund supervisors
- Finance managers
- International banking
- Mutual funds/insurance
- Brokers dealers
- Security professionals
- Company/business owners
- Public agency managers
- Audit and compliance personnel /risk managers
Panelist Profiles:
Richard Barr holds a B.S. in International Business Administration from San Jose State University in California. His professional experience spans over 23 years, 5 of which were spent with Wells Fargo Bank. Another 5 were spent honing his global banking skills, when Mr. Barr was intimately involved with international trade finance, real time gross settlement and cross border banking. The past 14 years have been in the private and high-tech sectors providing high-level consulting services, business analysis, project management and training to a wide range of banking clientele across the globe.
He has spent extensive time serving in diverse capacities for financial institutional clients in South Africa, Poland, Sweden, Ireland, Netherlands, Greece, Bermuda, Malawi, United Kingdom and across North America. Clients that Mr. Barr and Citadel Advantage have dealt with include notable firms such as AIB Bank, Eurobank, ABSA Bank, CitiBank, Swedbank, INDEbank, IBM, Montran and Fundtech, as well as many others.
He has also filled the role of advisor to central banks on payment systems and technical payments issues. Furthermore, key staff members from the Bank of England, South African Reserve Bank, Central Bank of Ireland, Bank Indonesia, European Central Bank and Bank of Portugal have attended training sessions presented by Mr. Barr.
Stanley Epstein has a master’s degree in economics which he earned with a dissertation on financial innovation and a bachelor of commerce degree in accounting. He has had extensive experience in banking and IT specifically the operations, payments, RTGS and the operational risk aspects of banking in the UK, Europe, the USA, Australia and southern Africa.
His bank-operations, payments systems, operational risk and clearing house experience is wide ranging and includes working closely with organizations such as UNCITRAL, Deutsche Bank and CHIPS in New York; APACS, British Bankers Association, CLS and Barclays Bank in London; Crédit Agricole in France; UBS and Credit Suisse in Switzerland, the central bank in the Netherlands; Alpha Bank in Greece; the central bank in Romania; the central bank in Kazakhstan; Bank Leumi and the central bank in Israel; the Standard Bank, Clearing Bankers Association; Bankserv and the central bank in South Africa and ANZ and Commonwealth Bank in Australia.
Commencing his career at the Standard Bank of South Africa he gained a thorough grounding in all aspects of banking ranging from the bank’s branch system, back-office payments processing. He was also closely involved in the development of electronic banking at the Standard Bank. At a banking industry level he was involved in the creation and development of STRATE (Central Securities Depository) in South Africa dealing with the dematerialization, clearing and settlement of all financial instruments in that country. He also served as vice chairman of the South African Clearing Bankers Association’s ERAG Group (an interbank payments/operations risk initiative established to identify and eliminate operational, legal and other risks in electronic payments) and later as chairman of the Payments Association of South Africa Operational Risk Committee. On leaving South Africa he joined Fundtech Corporation, a leading provider of financial technology based in the US.
