MonetaGo Selected by the Association of Banks in Singapore to Deliver Trade Finance Registry
Financial technology solutions provider MonetaGo has been selected by the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) to deliver the Trade Finance Registry (TFR), an interoperable industry utility that bridges information silos between banks to combat duplicate financing fraud.
The TFR serves as a secure database for records of trade transactions financed across foreign and local banking institutions in Singapore. It shall also connect to trusted sources of information for validation checks on trade data. The TFR mitigates the risk of duplicate financing by different bank lenders for the same trade transaction, and the falsification of information supplied by borrowers. The effect shall be greater confidence among banks in the integrity of their clients and trade financing transactions.
Currently, banks rely on due diligence on their customers and transaction checks of the underlying trade flows to make trade financing available to their clients. However, there are limitations as banks rely on documents which are prone to forgery. In addition, banks are unable to ascertain if a particular trade has been financed more than once as these checks are restricted to within that particular bank or within their bank network.
The information silos between different banks expose the banking industry to potential fraudulent activities such as duplicate financing or round-tripping, where the same transaction is taken to multiple banks for financing.
