Global Financial Integrity (GFI), the Washington-based non-profit best known for its work researching and lobbying to prevent illicit financial flows, has developed a cloud-based risk assessment application to detect misinvoicing.

GFTrade provides accurate results efficiently, consistently and with minimal training and is suitable for any institution providing letters of credit (L/Cs) GFI claims.

The system enables trade finance and compliance teams to determine if the declared value on trade finance applications is outside typical ranges for the same product between the same two trading partners.

How it works

GFTrade is integrated into a bank's operating systems to ensure all trade finance applications received by the bank are automatically checked by the tool, so misinvoicing is easier to detect according to GFI.

This aims to help improve efficiency in the processing of trade finance applications as more focus and scrutiny will be placed on applications or commodities identified as likely posing a high risk of misinvoicing, whereas low-risk applications or commodities will be quickly approved, saving time and energy.

Updated geographical coverage

The developers say the system has the most up to date trade data for 43 of the world's largest trading nations including the US, China, Japan and all Eurostat countries so there is a high probability the tool contains the information required to verify the cost of the goods being financed.

The tool is updated automatically each month with no technical requirements by the end-user.

Trade data is provided at the tariff-level (8-, 9-, and 10-digit codes) to ensure maximum accuracy in average pricing and trade data for additional countries is available upon request.

This article represents the views of the author and not necessarily those of the ICC or Coastline Solutions.