On 7-8 June 2016, Nextrade Founder and CEO Kati Suominen joined the central point for leaders in the global trade and supply chain ecosystem, the World Trade Symposium, in London. Co-sponsored by the Financial Times and MISYS, the leading financal services software provider, the exclusive high-level forum featured global and regional leaders in business, finance, technology, politics and economics – to inspire, educate, and foster the future of connected commerce

 

Suominen spoke on a panel "Trade and globalisation: What’s working and what needs to change as trade, finance, technology and people converge?" featuring Ken Ash, Director of Trade & Agriculture, OECD; Robert Koopman, Chief Economist and  Director of Economic Research and Statistics Division,  World Trade Organisation (WTO); Michael Gidney, Chief Executive, The Fairtrade Foundation, and Douglas Lippoldt, Senior Trade Economist, Global Research, HSBC Holdings. Alexander Malaket of OPUS Advisory Services International moderated.

 

Suominen discussed ideas for:

 

• Export credit agencies to work with a broader set of players than banks (such as alternative finance platforms) to help export-driven SMEs secure credit

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• Why venture capital and private equity funds hould view export-driven companies as an outperforming asset class

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• The critical importance of new sources of growth capital for companies' global competitiveness now that many companies are "born global" and unbankable during their first inroads into international markets

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• Importance of public-private partnerships to undo bottlenecks to ecommerce, illustrated by the multi-stakeholder initiative Aid for eTrade to accelerate ecommerce in developing world she ideated and is building with the United Nations and leading corporations; and

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• Measures to facilitate trade in low-cost items, such as through a plurilateral agreement on de minimis.

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Suominen also had the opportunity to moderate a roundtable discussion among banks, SMEs, and trade finance experts on ways that banks could better service SME clients amid the growing capital requirements and tight KYC/AML requirements.