Singapore Introduces Trade Service to Help With Trade Financing Compliance
Singapore Customs introduced a new online trade service, Trade Finance Compliance (TFC), to “address compliance challenges” for certain companies and banks “when financing trade,” Singapore Customs said in a Sept. 5 press release. TFC, which operates on the country’s online Networked Trade Platform (NTP), is a joint project of Singapore Customs and the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to address companies’ “inability to validate the underlying trade and the lack of reliable data to conduct price checks for non-commodity goods,” the press release said.
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The TFC will allow “financial institutions” to reference “data derived from permits issued by Singapore Customs … to augment their checks for trade finance compliance.” Traders can give consent on the NTP so their data is “shared directly with financial institutions of their choice,” it said. So far, there are six banks participating in the TFC service, the release said.
The TFC will “increase the efficiency and accuracy of trade finance compliance checks,” Gillian Tan, an executive director for the MAS, said in a statement. “As a result, these financial institutions will be able to better assess fraud and mitigate risks associated with trade-based money laundering,” Tan said.
“The NTP is the one-stop trade and logistics ecosystem for Singapore and will be introducing a series of initiatives to link up the various parts of the trade ecosystem to enable all stakeholders to reap the benefits of digitalisation, connectivity and interoperability,” the release said.