Global payment services firm Swift announced that GlobalTrade Corporation (GTC), provider of multi-bank trade finance solutions, was the first trade finance technology provider to integrate Alliance Lite2 for Business Applications (L2BA) with its multi-bank trade finance platform for corporates.

L2BA enables providers to combine the value of their business applications with a SWIFT connection to the financial industry. By integrating its application with L2BA, GTC offers corporates a single, cost-effective one-stop-shop to automate trade flows with their multiple banking partners - covering over 10,800 financial institutions in more than 200 countries. Besides corporates, banks will also benefit from L2BA through the re-use of their established SWIFT connectivity.

"Trade Finance is one of the key priorities of Swift's corporate treasury market strategy", says André Casterman, global head of corporate and supply chain markets, Swift. "We are witnessing an increasing control of corporates on their trade finance flows; this is being achieved through centralisation, automation and the use of multi-banking trade solutions. Banks can support this by implementing Swift's standards for trade and supply chain finance such as the MT 798 and ISO 20022. This is an opportunity for trade banks as the technology will help them grow their risk mitigation and financing business."