André Casterman, who used to be in charge of SWIFT’s business in France, was appointed head of the cooperative’s trade and supply chain team in October last year. His remit includes both traditional trade and the supply chain markets. It extends from inter-bank transactions to corporate-to-bank flows. He and his team are spearheading a renewed focus on trade for SWIFT at a time when banks are more interested than ever in offering their corporate clients ways to be more competitive.

Commenting on SWIFT’s goals in this space, Casterman is clear and succinct: “our mission in trade and supply chain is to help banks provide innovative trade and supply chain services that enable their corporate customers to reduce risk, enhance process efficiency and improve liquidity management.”

SWIFT’s trade team is working on a series of initiatives to support this goal and is now also looking at how it...