The Professor of Credit Management and MSc Finance, Programme Leader at a prestigious UK University, and Programme Leader for the Singapore Accountancy Academy (SAA-GE), has read and now recommends ‘Credit Risk Management – The Novel’.
To advise her decision she wrote as follows: “I have recommended your book to a few libraries and added it to my recommended reading (other reading) list.”
The printed version of Credit Risk Management – The Novel (Part One) is now available from eStoreT3P, Amazon.com and 11 country specific Amazon websites. It can also be purchased through the CreateSpace eStore.
This paperback version is available worldwide in other retail book stores; place your order with your favourite bookstore today.
The ISBN13 is 978-0-9576279-2-5.
This is not a text book, it is a story that follows the day to day work of a credit risk management team as they face and overcome various challenges. You are invited to 'listen in' to their conversations and read the outline of the solutions they employ. The detail of their solutions appears at the end of the book so reading the detail is optional.
There is a parallel story that follows the adventures of James E Cricket an Agent of the Office of Peace, which provides an undercurrent of twists and turns.
The Novel doubles as a reference book, which will be useful if you meet credit management challenges similar to those solved by the fictional credit team.
See: http://www.barrettwells.com to read a Five Star reader review posted on Amazon.com.
Monday, September 29, 2014
Tuesday, September 9, 2014
Ode to LCs past and BPOs to come
Do you have BPO?
What's BPO?
I'll take that as a NO
BPO replaces SBLCs
BPO-Plus replaces DocLCs
BPO Reduces Costs
Improves Working Capital!
Why haven't I heard of BPO?
'Cause your TF Banker is afraid
Afraid to spill the beans.
Why?
'Cause it threatens his/her job
Oh, I shall find another bank
a BPO friendly bank
Where can I find a list?
A BPO ready bank list?
At SWIFT.com you'll find a list
A BPO ready bank list :o)
I can't find the list
The BPO ready bank list
It's hidden on SWIFT.com
Search for 'BPO Market Adoption SWIFT’
To find the BPO ready bank list
What's BPO?
I'll take that as a NO
BPO replaces SBLCs
BPO-Plus replaces DocLCs
BPO Reduces Costs
Improves Working Capital!
Why haven't I heard of BPO?
'Cause your TF Banker is afraid
Afraid to spill the beans.
Why?
'Cause it threatens his/her job
Oh, I shall find another bank
a BPO friendly bank
Where can I find a list?
A BPO ready bank list?
At SWIFT.com you'll find a list
A BPO ready bank list :o)
I can't find the list
The BPO ready bank list
It's hidden on SWIFT.com
Search for 'BPO Market Adoption SWIFT’
To find the BPO ready bank list
Monday, September 1, 2014
Bank Payment Obligations (BPOs) – Basics for Corporates
Whether you are a Seller or Buyer of goods this article provides the basic information you need in order to start replacing Standby Letters of Credit and/or Documentary Letters of Credit (LCs) with the BPO or BPO-Plus process respectively.
You can download a copy of this article by clicking here.
Why bother to make the change?
Companies that adopt the BPO and/or BPO-Plus processes are able to capture a number of benefits from the BPO system; for example:
• Improved cash flow management based on certainty as to when invoice payments will be credited.
• Reduced document handling – whether paper or electronic – since purchase orders and invoices are keyed into the system and communicated automatically; via one or two banks in nanoseconds. The SWIFT system is exceptionally secure and reliable, and covers more than 10,000 financial institutions and corporations in 210 countries
• Reduced information discrepancies and/or reduced time involved in identifying and correcting mismatched data. The BPO system automatically matches buyer and seller data against the Purchase Order/Contract baseline and provides various reports
• Better payment protection (for the seller) compared to a Standby or Documentary Letter of Credit; with reduced costs and handling required on both sides of a transaction
• Access to financing options is improved for both buyer and seller
According to an article that you can find with this link.
“This process (the BPO & BPO-Plus) results in a fully electronic alternative to the letter of credit (LC), which will enable efficiency gains, working capital reduction and cost saving. This electronic alternative can be processed in a much shorter time than traditional, paper-based LCs – estimates are as low as 10-15 days. Reduced processing times result in significant cost savings: Brazilian mining company Vale estimates that a combination of electronic bills of lading and BPOs is saving it $37 million per year on its exports of iron ore to China alone.”
The BPO Train is leaving the station, so you better hurry to catch it… or risk being left in the LC dust by your competitors…
It is understandable that many Trade Finance Bankers will resist the switch to BPO and BPO-Plus but it would be preferable for them to accept that BPO related changes are unstoppable. The sooner Bankers accept that and start to make the necessary changes in their careers the better, delay will only mean more painful and difficult changes will have to be made later.
In 2000 Gary Hamel wrote in his book ‘Leading the Revolution’: …”change has changed. No longer is it additive. No longer does it move in a straight line. In the twenty-first century, change is discontinuous, abrupt, and seditious. We now stand on the threshold of a new age – the age of revolution. In our minds we know the new age has already arrived; in our bellies, we’re not sure we like it. For we know it is going to be an age of upheaval, of tumult, of fortunes made and unmade at head-snapping speed.”
In fact it was in 2000 that TradeCard brought its solution to market, a product that BPO more than resembles, it virtually mirrors. Admittedly it has taken 14 years for the BPO to become a globally viable LC alternative but the challenges overcome in terms of proving the technologies involved, agreeing standards and putting in place internationally accepted rules have been formidable.
The prize for banks and users (exporters/sellers, importers/buyers and traders) is significant.
On the other hand there will inevitably be losers, mainly those who have built a career on the basis of UCP expertise; bankers, consultants, trainers and academics. The losers’ whose ‘cheese is being moved’ can denounce this development, and try to derail or delay the transition, but like blowing against the wind such efforts to maintain the status quo will prove fruitless in the end.
Today one can be a Kodak strategist until one’s world falls apart when the ‘digital camera producers’ destroy the business and associated jobs, or one can recognise the signs and start searching for ‘new cheese’. As Lynda Gratton wrote in ‘The Shift – The Future of Work is Already Here’: “In a world of more and more complex technology, it is the highly skilled, or what I call those with serial mastery, who will always find work.”
Those who do not notice their 'cheese' disappearing and do not set out to find ‘new cheese’ (a new expert occupation) will, I’m afraid, find it difficult to maintain their current standard of living.
William Gibson in 1993 famously said: “The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed.”
Ron Wells
You can download a copy of this article by clicking here.
Why bother to make the change?
Companies that adopt the BPO and/or BPO-Plus processes are able to capture a number of benefits from the BPO system; for example:
• Improved cash flow management based on certainty as to when invoice payments will be credited.
• Reduced document handling – whether paper or electronic – since purchase orders and invoices are keyed into the system and communicated automatically; via one or two banks in nanoseconds. The SWIFT system is exceptionally secure and reliable, and covers more than 10,000 financial institutions and corporations in 210 countries
• Reduced information discrepancies and/or reduced time involved in identifying and correcting mismatched data. The BPO system automatically matches buyer and seller data against the Purchase Order/Contract baseline and provides various reports
• Better payment protection (for the seller) compared to a Standby or Documentary Letter of Credit; with reduced costs and handling required on both sides of a transaction
• Access to financing options is improved for both buyer and seller
According to an article that you can find with this link.
“This process (the BPO & BPO-Plus) results in a fully electronic alternative to the letter of credit (LC), which will enable efficiency gains, working capital reduction and cost saving. This electronic alternative can be processed in a much shorter time than traditional, paper-based LCs – estimates are as low as 10-15 days. Reduced processing times result in significant cost savings: Brazilian mining company Vale estimates that a combination of electronic bills of lading and BPOs is saving it $37 million per year on its exports of iron ore to China alone.”
The BPO Train is leaving the station, so you better hurry to catch it… or risk being left in the LC dust by your competitors…
It is understandable that many Trade Finance Bankers will resist the switch to BPO and BPO-Plus but it would be preferable for them to accept that BPO related changes are unstoppable. The sooner Bankers accept that and start to make the necessary changes in their careers the better, delay will only mean more painful and difficult changes will have to be made later.
In 2000 Gary Hamel wrote in his book ‘Leading the Revolution’: …”change has changed. No longer is it additive. No longer does it move in a straight line. In the twenty-first century, change is discontinuous, abrupt, and seditious. We now stand on the threshold of a new age – the age of revolution. In our minds we know the new age has already arrived; in our bellies, we’re not sure we like it. For we know it is going to be an age of upheaval, of tumult, of fortunes made and unmade at head-snapping speed.”
In fact it was in 2000 that TradeCard brought its solution to market, a product that BPO more than resembles, it virtually mirrors. Admittedly it has taken 14 years for the BPO to become a globally viable LC alternative but the challenges overcome in terms of proving the technologies involved, agreeing standards and putting in place internationally accepted rules have been formidable.
The prize for banks and users (exporters/sellers, importers/buyers and traders) is significant.
On the other hand there will inevitably be losers, mainly those who have built a career on the basis of UCP expertise; bankers, consultants, trainers and academics. The losers’ whose ‘cheese is being moved’ can denounce this development, and try to derail or delay the transition, but like blowing against the wind such efforts to maintain the status quo will prove fruitless in the end.
Today one can be a Kodak strategist until one’s world falls apart when the ‘digital camera producers’ destroy the business and associated jobs, or one can recognise the signs and start searching for ‘new cheese’. As Lynda Gratton wrote in ‘The Shift – The Future of Work is Already Here’: “In a world of more and more complex technology, it is the highly skilled, or what I call those with serial mastery, who will always find work.”
Those who do not notice their 'cheese' disappearing and do not set out to find ‘new cheese’ (a new expert occupation) will, I’m afraid, find it difficult to maintain their current standard of living.
William Gibson in 1993 famously said: “The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed.”
Ron Wells
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