Three centres open in Gauteng ONE OF the pioneers of the one-stop trade shop concept, Standard Corporate and Merchant Bank (SCMB) has recently restructured its international trade operations to bring the market a comprehensive knowledge base under one roof, at strategically placed International Business Centres (IBCs).
The idea is to centralise the sales, delivery and processing of trade.
Pretoria and Cape Town were the first to come on stream, with three centres in greater Gauteng - Isando, Sandton and central Johannesburg - having just opened their doors.
Says Owen Tidbury, SCMB International Division director: The influx of foreign banks into our market is a welcome development. This has allowed us to become more creative in the products and services we offer existing and potential international merchants. Experienced consultants at the bank's IBCs offer a variety of innovative packages over and above the bank's financial instruments, structured to suit traders' unique circumstances and requirements.
These packages include back-to-back letters of credit, short-term export finance incentive schemes, forfeiting and export factoring.
Global trade is a highly complex and specialised field. In addition to structuring foreign trade packages, importers and exporters need to source products or market abroad. Here too banks need to be creative and Standard Bank has a well established Foreign Trade Promotion Unit that offers customer education programmes together with a variety of technical publications to ensure the success, profitability and sustained growth of international business, said Tidbury.
