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December
Despite some of the volatility in the commodity markets, bank lending to major commodity trading groups is more vibrant than ever. Recent deals also reveal that such deals are also bringing in many new lenders. Jonathan Bell explores the developments.
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Oliver O'Connell sat down with Urvashi Zutshi, managing director and head of Energy, Commodities and Transportation at ABN AMRO in the US, to talk about the unit's growth and plans going forward.
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Colin George, director, trade, commodity and agribusiness finance at EFIC, explains how the Australian agency applies its role as an ECA in the agricultural sector.
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Fifth Third Bank has made an internal promotion in naming the bank’s new head of the global commodity trader segment.
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The Brazilian Central Bank has finally loosened the restrictions on the tenor of pre-export financings.
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November
Russian fertiliser manufacturer UralChem is tapping the trade finance market having mandated five banks to arrange a credit facility.
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Pembani Remgro Infrastructure Fund, The Carlyle Group, and Standard Chartered have invested in Export Trading Group, a global agricultural supply chain manager.
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October
Netherlands-based GE Artesia Bank has appointed Caspar Jonk to boost its trade and commodity finance offering.
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Standard Bank has appointed a new senior executive to its London-based structured trade & commodity finance team.
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Ukrainian agricultural producer Creative Group has successfully signed a pre-export financing with a group of international banks.
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Jonathan Bell spoke to Craig Polkinghorne at Standard Bank about the changing face of African trade and bank’s unique position in financing African commodity trade.
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Jonathan Bell spoke to Jean-François Lambert, managing director, global head of commodity and structured trade finance at HSBC, about trends in the commodity finance market.
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ING Bank has provided a pre-export loan facility to finance Ukrainian sunflower oil producer Myronivsky Hliboproduct Group.
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Just two years ago, MIT* the Lausanne based trade finance software vendor, launched a new system called Trade Risk Active Control (TRAC). To measure the product’s success so far but to gain a better understanding of its capabilities beforehand, Trade Finance Magazine (TFM) spoke with Paul Cohen Dumani, General Manager of MIT.
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Ecom Agroindustrial has this week signed its multi-currency revolving credit facility.
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September
HSBC has issued its first renminbi denominated documentary credit in India for a pharmaceuticals company based in Mumbai.
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HSBC will host a meeting in Hong Kong to discuss opportunities in Mauritius for companies wanting to explore African markets.
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The importance of the emerging markets on the commodity sector, both in terms of imports and financing, has been highlighted during panel discussions at the LMA syndicated loans conference
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OPIC has announced that it will provide political risk insurance for the modernisation of Ghana’s agricultural sector.
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EBRD is backing the Ukrainian agri-sector with a revolving loan to a private producer of agricultural commodities.
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The Ghana Cocoa Board has signed its annual pre-export financing with a group of international banks.
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Craig Polkinghorne at Standard Bank speaks about the bank’s unique position in financing African commodity trade.
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The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ has hired a managing director in the commodities and structured trade finance group of the bank’s Americas division.
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IFC’s trade and supply chain team has hired a Hong Kong-based trade and commodity finance specialist to expand its presence in Asia.
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August
ANZ Fiji has provided a structured trade finance facility for the Fiji Sugar Corporation.
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Commodity trader Trafigura has signed an increased an extended revolving credit facility to finance its North American operations through a syndicate of 18 banks.
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Ukrainian grain and sunflower oil agribusiness, Kernel Group, has approached the syndicated loan market for a refinancing.
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Armajaro Trading licences Triple Point Technology software for commodity procurement, logistics, trading and credit risk management.
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The Vietnamese government has granted the German law firm SNB a licence to open a branch and operate in the country.
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Ecom Agroindustrial has mandated banks to arrange a refinancing facility.
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Growth of the Canadian export market drives expansion for trade documentation company Trade Technologies.
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Law firm Milbank has advised underwriters in two key Latin American capital market transactions demonstrating the increased use of these tools for corporates and financial institutions in the region.
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The Dubai Multi Commodities Centre has seen a strong rate of growth for the first half of the year, including a 60% increase in the number of companies using the service.
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July
Rabobank International has adopted Triquesta Collateral Manager for use in its collateral and risk management operations.
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Commodity trading and production company Olam has signed a landmark loan with a group of African banks to secure funding for the first phase of its oil palm plantation in Gabon.
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The EBRD is providing a financing package to Ukraine’s Agrotrade to help expand grain handling facilities.
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The annual jumbo pre-export financing for the Ghana Cocoa Board has moved to a more market realistic pricing structure under a different format.
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Commodity traders are continuing to face difficult times in the market, but for some the changes are presenting challenges that are allowing them to grow and expand along with emerging market trade flows. Kimberley Long reports.
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IFC and ING launch $500 million facility to support global commodities trade.
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The Export-Import Bank of China has signed a memorandum of cooperation with the Ukraine to support agricultural projects.
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June
Proparco has agreed a 10-year loan to the Sugar Corporation of Ugandan to help to boost the company’s performance.
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Mizuho Corporate Bank has reached an agreement with WestLB to buy the bank’s Brazilian corporate banking subsidiary.
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London-headquartered trade finance boutique and insurance broker, Texel Finance, has hired a veteran commodity banker to help develop its growing portfolio of business.
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South-East Asian palm oil producer APICAL has raised $350 million through a borrowing base facility.
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The Brazilian government has begun to loosen restrictions on the inflow of foreign currency into the country.
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IFC and Rabobank launch Critical Commodity Finance facility to expand financing for the global commodities trade in developing countries.
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Pascal Lamy, director general of the WTO, stressed the need to support the financing of commodities in an address to Trade Finance and Euromoney Seminars’ Global Commodities Finance conference in Geneva.
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Providing the right mindset
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May
IsDB Group and Niger sign deal to support food security through Islamic Trade Finance Corporation.
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The EBRD is providing a loan to Turk Ekonomi Bankasi for onlending to agri-businesses in Turkey.
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Commodity trading company Trafigura has appointed a new chief financial officer for the EMEA region.
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Jonathan Bell talks with global heads of commodity finance about the state of market.
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Highlights from the May 2012 print edition of Trade Finance Magazine.
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April
A world of opportunity in commodities – by Paul Gardner, head of structured trade and export finance, Asia, at Deutsche Bank in Singapore.
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Oliver O'Connell reports on the availability of credit for US agribusiness as it steps up to export opportunities in emerging markets.
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Commodity trader Ecom Agroindustrial Corporation has signed a revolving credit facility with a syndicate of international banks.
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Scipion Capital, an African investment specialist, has opened its commodity trade finance fund to the US market, to take further advantage of increased demand resulting from the capital squeeze in the banking sector.
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Australia’s Westpac is open its first branch in India to increase commercial banking in the region.
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Tobacco processor and vendor Alliance One International has doubled the size of its existing trade receivables securitisation programme.
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DBS and Standard Chartered are near to signing a revolving credit facility for commodities trader Ecom Agroindustrial Corp (Ecom).
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The International Finance Corporation (IFC) is poised to sign its latest Global Warehouse Finance Programme (GWFP) in Guinea Bissau, the first time the multilateral has done a deal in the West African country for 17 years.
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Swiss-based Hinduja Bank raids Geneva trade banks for five senior trade financiers.
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HSBC has promoted Andrew Robison to deputy head of commodity and structured trade finance UK.
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Société Générale CIB has announced a new organisational set-up of key divisions, designed to strengthen services to clients.
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Commodity trading company ED&F Man has signed a new revolving credit facility with a wide-ranging group of international banks.
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BNP Paribas has teamed up with IFC to boost agri-financing in sub-Saharan Africa and Eastern Europe.
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Bookrunners have launched Noble’s jumbo revolving credit facility.
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March
BNP Paribas is set to be the first bank to launch a proprietary trade finance fund.
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DMCC Tradeflow, the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC) web-based registry for commodities stored in warehouses, reports more than 100 pledges since February 2012.
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Brazil’s national development bank, BNDES, is to make available new finance for the revamp and further development of the country’s sugar sector.
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Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod) is set to draw down on in its three-year pre-export financing this week.
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The Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod) has scaled back the size of its requested proposals from banks for its 20th annual jumbo pre-export financing.
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Agri-business execs reveal plans to boost investment, according to a survey by law firm Norton Rose.
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WTO chief Pascal Lamy is giving the keynote speech at Trade Finance Magazine’s 9th Annual Global Commodities Finance Conference, held in Geneva on 14 June.
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A structured Brazilian record-breaker
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Commodities trader Trafigura has increased its overall bank lines, explains Trafigura’s global head of corporate finance, in an interview with Trade Finance Magazine.
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The first investment under the IFC’s Critical Commodities Finance Programme was made yesterday. IFC also extends Global Trade Liquidity Programme.
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Brazil's Central Bank imposes trade finance restrictions from foreign lenders as well as a host of new tax measures which will impact offshore short-term export and trade loans to Brazilian firms.
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February
The Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod) has requested proposals from banks for its 20th annual jumbo pre-export financing.
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Dubai Multi Commodities Centre has launched DMCC Tradeflow to electronically bring together inventory-based financing parties.
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Banks are in the final stages of signing a club borrowing base facility for commodity trader Trafigura.
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The International Islamic Trade Finance Corporation has signed a structured commodity financing on behalf of PT Angels Products, an Indonesian sugar refinery.
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Noble Agri Limited, the parent company of trader Noble’s agriculture businesses, has appointed José Luiz Glaser as CEO.
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The Brazilian soft commodity financing market has seen its ups and downs over the past few years, and the second half of 2011 saw a return to a more cautious approach to lending. Oliver O’Connell looks at the shifting market.
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On the back of an impressive year in which Uralkali acquired rival potash producer Silvinit, Dickon Harris speaks to Uralkali's CFO Viktor Belyakov about the firm’s financing plans for 2012.
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Lloyds Bank has signed a secured working capital facility for UK grain trader, Wessex Grain, as well as a secured capital expansion loan.
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Christian de Lima Ramos and Ben-Hur Cabrera of Sao Paulo-based law firm Ramos, Zuanon e Manassero Advogados examine the growing use of fiduciary lien on credit transactions in Brazil to create security over collateral.
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Nedbank Capital has appointed former Standard Chartered agribusiness specialist as its new head of African business.
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January
Watson Farley Williams’ partner, Celia Gardiner, provides a simple guide to borrowing base facilities, an increasingly popular structured commodity financing instrument for both traders and commodity producers.
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Banks have signed a structured commodity facility on behalf of Senegalese groundnut producer Suneor.
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Banks have launched a new three-year pre-export financing yesterday on behalf of Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod).
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Standard Chartered Bank’s private equity division has acquired a minority stake in African soft commodity trader Export Trading Group.
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Cheap resources underpinned economic growth for much of the 20th century. The 21st will be different.
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While the US and Europe struggle, the Asia-Pacific region has prospered, propping up global prices for commodities across the spectrum from metals and minerals to food and cooking oils. Graeme Burton examines the scene.