Malaysia’s economy is on the path to recovery. This is apparent from reports recording the country’s total trade for February this year marking an increase of 17.5% to RM184.75 billion compared to the RM157.3 billion last year.
Exports increased by 16.8% to RM102.3 billion in February 2022. Imports amounted to RM82.5 billion, growing by 18.4% year-on-year (y-o-y)[1]. As international trade continues to recover, businesses are looking for ways to capitalise on the opportunities and maximise their gains.
These businesses can utilise trade financing tools comprising financial instruments and products, to help facilitate international trade. Financial instruments such as Bankers Acceptance, Letter of Credit and Bank Guarantee protect businesses against potential risks arising from international trade transactions including creditworthiness, shipments and non-payment.
Alliance Bank launched the BizSmart® eTrade, Malaysia’s first mobile trade financing submission platform, in July 2020 to help business owners manage and grow their businesses more efficiently.
This enabled submission of Bankers Acceptance or Trust Receipts digitally via the BizSmart® Mobile app or online without physically visiting any branches. Submissions can be done anytime, anywhere, and users will be notified of their transaction status through email, SMS and push notifications via the BizSmart® Mobile app.
“Traditional trade financing submissions typically involve extensive manual administrative processes. As a bank that strives to be the ‘Preferred Bank of Business Owners’, we understand business owners’ needs to procure funds quickly to capture market opportunities. This is where the BizSmart® eTrade comes in – to provide fast approval and disbursement of funds,” Jeff Tham, Group Chief Corporate and Transaction Banking Officer of Alliance Bank explained.
Tailored to the needs of business owners, the BizSmart® eTrade platform has been enhanced to incorporate digital applications for Promissory Note and supplier payments to over 85 countries in all major currencies for Bankers Acceptance, Trust Receipts and Promissory Note. The inclusion of promissory note provides more options and flexibility to business owners, allowing them to choose the trade finance instruments that best fit their business operation needs.
Meanwhile, Anson Au Yong, Operations Manager, Tiong Tat Printing Industry Sdn Bhd said, “The Alliance Bank BizSmart® eTrade platform is fast and convenient, and solves the need to submit the document to the branch before cut-off time. With the e-draft, there is no need to manage physical Banker’s Acceptance drafts anymore. In our opinion, this enhances the security level in document handling as the authoriser has better control of all trade applications’ approval via the token without worries of misplacing the physical draft or forged signature.”
The solution has built-in real-time available balance and transaction details verification. This minimises the hassle of having to rework and resubmit their trade transaction. The secured platform features multiple layers of user access authentication to protect users from unauthorised login and transactions. Users also receive transaction status notification that keeps them informed of the account activities.
Over the years, BizSmart® eTrade has provided a fast, simple and convenient platform for businesses, especially in the manufacturing, wholesale and retail sectors, to manage and scale more efficiently. The digital platform has won several regional and local recognitions including the Asia Trailblazer 2021 Awards for Excellence in Customer Centricity and Retail Banking Awards 2021 for Mobile Banking & Payment Initiative.
Alliance Bank is continuously enhancing BizSmart® eTrade to achieve its target of increasing the total of small-and-medium enterprise (SME) trade transactions conducted digitally to 50% from 45%. To realise this target, Alliance Bank will be improving the BizSmart® eTrade platform to include Letter of Credit and Bank Guarantee digital applications, and biometric approvals for transactions in the future.
Join our Telegram group for the latest updates!
Read more: Shoppymore – Malaysia’s Latest and Safest Online Retail Platform
Discussion about this post