(14 December 2023 – Belgium) Swift has successfully tested a global trade interoperability solution in collaboration with BNY Mellon, Deutsche Bank and four electronic bills of lading (eBL) platforms.
This solution has the potential to revolutionise the use of electronic trade documents acording to the group.
To boost Electronic bills of lading (eBL) adoption, several industry are underway with 80 institutions signing on to FIT Alliance’s “declaration of the electronic bill of lading,” committing to drive digitalisation within their industries while the UK Electronic Trade Documents Act (ETDA) grants electronic trade documents the same legal significance as their paper equivalents, marking an important milestone.
“Standards set with the industry, combined with global interoperability facilitated by Swift, can enable eBL providers and digital trade platforms to seamlessly interact with banks, corporates, and the wider trade ecosystem” commented Swift Global Head, Wholesale Payments & Trade Strategy, Shirish Wadivkar.
“We see clear value in this Proof of Concept with Swift, Deutsche Bank and the trade platforms. There is potential for banks to reuse their Swift infrastructure to reduce the time, and most importantly the costs, associated with document exchange. This work could not only benefit BNY Mellon, but also our clients in removing the frictions that paper Bills of Lading cause today” commented BNY Mellon Global Head of Trade Finance, Joon Kim.
“Collaborative innovation between banks and trade platforms was central to the success of this interoperability Proof of Concept. This work to standardise and automate the eBL transfer process will help deliver a significantly more efficient, reliable and secure supply chain process in the future” stated Deutsche Bank Senior Product Manager, Michael Fenyk.