Casterman Advisory

Looking forward to next week's event in Dubai organised by The Economist "4th annual Global Trade and Supply Chain Summit" starting with keynote by Dr. Thani Al Zeyoudi. Targeting the audience of corporate treasurers, supply chain managers and procurement leaders, our panel is entitled "Powering up trade through tech innovation" and will comprise three trade experts: Javad Mohammadi, Group Chief Procurement Officer at Mammut Group Fernanda Herrmann - LL.M., Customs and International Trade, Senior Director - Global Customs & Trade at PepsiCo André Casterman, Board Member at ITFA & Founder at Casterman Advisory. Moderated by John Ferguson, Global Lead - New Globalisation at Economist Impact, the session will focus on: - How will AI, blockchain, IoT and cyber-security technologies optimise supply chains? - How can these advancements redefine the future of international commerce? - How can business leaders leverage this to gain a competitive edge? - Can these technologies make global trade more efficient and reliable, or are their real-world applications still limited? - What factors should business leaders consider when deciding which of these technologies to adopt to gain a competitive edge? More info: https://lnkd.in/dxJBj5H DNI Initiative TFD Initiative

Still not convinced about the use of blockchain and tokenisation in trade finance? Need more proof-points to get over the line? I concur with your analysis as it took me some [pre-pandemic] years to cross the blockchain line as well. On February 22nd, members of the ITFA #Fintech #Committee gathered in Dubai to showcase their use of digital assets in trade finance and liquidity management across origination, distribution and collateral management. Experts from Mitigram, Enigio, ComTech Gold, Tradeteq, Fathom Protocol, Casterman Advisory, ITFA, Vayana TradeXchange, TradeFinex, XDC Trade Network and Vayana shared their vision and value propositions leveraging either basic (e.g., tracking) or advanced (e.g., stablecoins, security token offerings) layer 1 blockchain capabilities. As I put at the beginning of the briefing: "XinFin Powering XDC Network is the only ITFA member providing a layer 1 blockchain supporting banks, alternative lenders and fintechs active in SME lending, private debt and trade finance." Chris Southworth, Secretary General of ICC United Kingdom joined us and concluded the event by stating: "I learned a terrific amount. My big message overall is : if we are not doing it now, when are we going to do it? I think it's now. It's an enormous opportunity for trade and finance overall". Watch the video for more insights. DNI Initiative TFD Initiative Many thanks to the XinFin Powering XDC Network team - Ritesh Kakkad Atul Khekade Saloi B. - for welcoming us to their beautiful premises at the Emirates Financial Towers in Dubai.

Still not convinced about the use of blockchain and tokenisation in trade finance? Need more proof-points to get over the line? I concur with your analysis as it took me some [pre-pandemic] years to cross the blockchain line as well. On February 22nd, members of the ITFA #Fintech #Committee gathered in Dubai to showcase their use of digital assets in trade finance and liquidity management across origination, distribution and collateral management. Experts from Mitigram, Enigio, ComTech Gold, Tradeteq, Fathom Protocol, Casterman Advisory, ITFA, Vayana TradeXchange, TradeFinex, XDC Trade Network and Vayana shared their vision and value propositions leveraging either basic (e.g., tracking) or advanced (e.g., stablecoins, security token offerings) layer 1 blockchain capabilities. As I put at the beginning of the briefing: "XinFin Powering XDC Network is the only ITFA member providing a layer 1 blockchain supporting banks, alternative lenders and fintechs active in SME lending, private debt and trade finance." Chris Southworth, Secretary General of ICC United Kingdom joined us and concluded the event by stating: "I learned a terrific amount. My big message overall is : if we are not doing it now, when are we going to do it? I think it's now. It's an enormous opportunity for trade and finance overall". Watch the video for more insights. DNI Initiative TFD Initiative Many thanks to the XinFin Powering XDC Network team - Ritesh Kakkad Atul Khekade Saloi B. - for welcoming us to their beautiful premises at the Emirates Financial Towers in Dubai.

Terrific piece by Deutsche Bank following the recent BAFT (Bankers Association for Finance and Trade) Europe Bank-to-Bank conference. Deutsche Bank Corporate Bank's Clarissa Dann reports on the panel featuring Gwynne Master (Lloyds Banking Group); André Casterman (Casterman Advisory); Chris Sunderman (Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA); and Alberto Gutierrez (Barclays). This excellent article (linked below) outlines three distinct trends that I shared on the panel and that are unfolding in the new funding landscape: - New market entrants. Complementing the bank positions in trade finance, alternative trade finance and embedded lenders are providing more liquidity – particularly for smaller companies. “We see SMEs served by alternative non-bank platforms extending liquidity,” he said. - Logistics providers expand into trade. Using APIs to connect to financial systems, logistics providers are using funding from banks and the capital markets to service their customers. “There are a lot of opportunities to connect the B2B world where trade originates and the capital markets world looking for assets to allocate liquidity to.” Echoing some of the distribution themes from the Trade Finance Investor Day 2023 Casterman added that third party liquidity, moving from the originate to distribute model, also addressed balanced sheet considerations highlighted by BAFT CEO Tod Burwell earlier. - Regulation/policies and technological innovation driving change. This picks up Sharyn Trainor’s point about drivers of adoption and several themes in the Guide to Trade Finance about why single platforms had not been successful. “You cannot expect the whole world to join a single platform and you need operability,” reflected Casterman. He saw Web3 technology based on distributed ledger technology (DLT) as a key enabler here. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ewpSbQ6p The ITFA #Fintech #Committee is supporting new entrants engage with incumbents and new partners across origination and distribution. Reach out for more insights on DNI Initiative and TFD Initiative.

We look forward to connecting with link-minded individuals supporting the global #tradetech community. During the World Economic Forum TradeTech Forum taking place in Abu Dhabi, we will debate the growth to the #tradetech ecosystems. "Empowering small businesses through seamless access to liquidity" will be one of the sessions that André Casterman, Board Member ITFA and Fintech Chair will be contributing to. It will be moderated by Zul Javaid. Full agenda is here: https://lnkd.in/e6hsSKwD Dr. Thani Al Zeyoudi Mahmood Al Bastaki

*** Joint ITFA / XinFin Powering XDC Network #Tradetech briefing - Dubai Many thanks again to our fantastic line-up of #tradetetech experts who joined us at XinFin Powering XDC Network offices in Dubai last Thursday. They provided a deep dive into the "Use of digital assets in trade finance". We hope our in-person audience enjoyed it as much as we did. Aneel Sabir, Enigio; Joshua Kroeker, Mitigram; Kalyan Basu, Vayana TradeXchange; Sunil Senapati, XDC Trade Network; Navin Dsouza, ComTech Gold; Manuel Rensink, Fathom; Christoph Gugelmann, Tradeteq & Yieldteq; Ronit Ghose, Citi; Atul Khekade & Ritesh Kakkad, XinFin Powering XDC Network; Saloi B., TradeFinex and André Casterman, Casterman Advisory and ITFA. Speakers showcased how tokenisation and digital asset technologies are enhancing trade finance and lending practices across origination and distribution. They also expanded to tokenised gold used as collateral and a future trade-based token. Here is our recap video and more is coming along: DNI Initiative TFD Initiative ITFA Middle East ICC United Kingdom ITFA BAFT (Bankers Association for Finance and Trade)

I had the pleasure to share some thoughts on the recently approved BTC ETFs shared with Andrew Singer at the Global Finance Magazine. “The vast majority of corporates will not take the MicroStrategy approach,” André Casterman, managing director of Casterman Advisory, says that CFOs will not move their treasury funds into crypto en masse soon. Or, as Casterman told Global Finance Magazine, at a minimum, “it’s a great opportunity for asset managers to create new products.” Read the full story: "They may not be epochal, but they could spur innovation." https://lnkd.in/eC8R5f_p Global Finance Magazine #crypto #assets Andrea Fiano

Join us on December 11th at the ITFA Christmas Seminar taking place at the Hilton DoubleTree Tower Hill. As part of the afternoon seminar, we will focus on the following ecosystem developments as follows: "Turbulences in the Fintech Ecosystem and the emerging Open Trade environment" featuring Almila Arikan Sarbanoglu, CITF, Director, Working Capital - Receivables Finance, Kyriba; Elena Sankova, Global Solution Consulting, Finastra; Casimir Veisblat, Managing Director, tesselate and Dermot Canavan, COO Trade, Wholesale Banking COO, ING. Moderated by André Casterman, Board Member and Chair Fintech Committee, ITFA, the panel will assess how major banks and solution vendors navigate the ups and downs of fintechs entering the #TradeFinance ecosystem, and how the ecosystem will evolve in 2024 in terms of policy, openness and interoperability. After the half-day seminar, delegates are invited to the ITFA Christmas party taking place on the Savage Garden rooftop bar.