OFID and Standard Chartered Increase Risk Participation Programme
Standard Chartered Bank and the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) have expanded their Trade Finance Portfolio Risk Participation Programme from US$500m to US$1bn. This renewed agreement is expected to generate an estimated incremental trade volume reaching up to US$4bn per annum. Under the terms of the continued programme, OFID will provide guarantees against trade obligations of local banks in developing countries to improve capacity levels and increase confidence in local and regional trade flows. Standard Chartered will originate and act as a distribution agent.
The OFID-Standard Chartered programme is expanded to include more financial institution (FI) trade products, which provide the benefit of greater efficiency to obligor banks, allowing the banks to access trade finance without all the complexities of documentary credit. The enhanced programme aims to benefit 150 banks, which are spread over 25 countries and 20,000 clients.
“Building on the success of the initial OFID programme, this increase allows us to expand our capacity to support the growth of world trade flows and provide additional credit capacity for more banks to support trade transactions,” said George Nast, global head, products, transaction banking at Standard Chartered Bank. “In times of increasing uncertainty, we want to continuously encourage global trade – the lifeblood of the globally economy – and continuously facilitate trade relationships and trade flows.”