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During the last several months, ICC's Banking Commission has branched out with new initiatives on antimoney laundering (AML), has engaged in regional expansion and has received international recognition for its trade services activities.

A newly formed group, the "ICC Banking Commission Compliance Group", has been set up to respond to the increasing number of issues the industry faces in meeting the regulatory requirements around compliance for financial institutions. Composed of a small group of experts, the group will interact with, and draft guidance, policy submissions and responses to regulators on all topics related to compliance issues affecting the trade finance industry. Some of the issues to be covered:

• sanctions regulations and consequences of not understanding the requirements;

• customer due diligence requirements; • know your customer and correspondent banking requirements;

• AML in respect of trade; • terrorist finance and weapons proliferation;

• financial crime, including tax evasion and other offences relating to trade products and services; and

• narcotics and people trafficking.

The main bodies with which the Commission will interact include the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) headquartered in the OECD; the Wolfsberg Group, an association of eleven global banks, which aims to develop financial services industry standards in KYC, AML and counter-terrorist finance, as well as other finance industry groups. This broad remit reflects the seriousness with which the Commission views the growing problems associated with compliance.

A second Commission initiative is aimed at de-centralizing some of the Commission's activities by improving the global reach for ICC banking products and services. To accomplish this, the first step was to set up a regional banking commission in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, with the objective to engage policy makers and business on a dialogue relating to regional trade finance issues.

MENA's program is a full one. In Dubai in May, it organized a regional briefing on the new Bank Payment Obligation (URBPO) rules and reported the results of the new ICC Global Survey on Trade Finance. In September 2013, again in Dubai, it will organize a public relations trade event in parallel with SIBOS, an event that brings together 7,000 experts from financial institutions, multinational corporations and technology partners. And in November 2013, it will hold a trade facilitation consultation - by invitation only - to discuss trade finance challenges.

This regional initiative, if successful, could be followed by the establishment of regional banking commissions in other parts of the world as well.

In June, following on the successful launch of the URBPO rules and the approval of the revised ISBP, the Commission received a welcome accolade in the form of an award as the "best non-bank services provider" from the prestigious publication Trade and Forfaiting Review. The final results took a 75% weighting of the votes cast with the remaining 25% weighting being applied by the editor and based feedback from the marketplace, engagement from the institutions nominated, observations of deal flow and general activity and reports on nominations gathered over the last 12 months. The award for the best trade bank in the world was won by J.P. Morgan; the award for the most innovative trade bank was garnered by Standard Chartered.

Commenting on the Banking Commission award, Commission Chair Tan Kah Chye said: "This recognition marks the shifts taking place in the Banking Commission as we strive to keep pace with the changes taking place in world markets."

The Commission has scheduled its autumn meeting in Vienna from 21-25 October. Among the matters to be discussed will be implementation of the BPO rules and the new rules for the DOCDEX dispute resolution process. n

For further information about the meeting, contact Whitney Jolivet at wfh@iccwbo.org