The future of trade and corporate finance was discussed when the Falcon Group held its second annual Trade & Corporate Finance Forum for the region’s CEOs and CFOs at Dubai’s Atlantis Palm in April.
Lord Norman Lamont, former UK Chancellor of the exchequer, was the keynote speaker. Other speakers included Fabio Scacciavillani, Oman Investment Fund’s chief economist, and Daniel Schmand, Deutsche Bank’s managing director and head of trade finance for West Europe and MENA.
Lord Lamont spoke of China’s extensive appetite for global natural resources and looked at the problems this posed for other countries. His other focus was the risk of protectionism in which he pointed out the dangers and consequences that could be posed for the world economy and trade.
Fabio scacciavillani spoke about the inflationary pressures in emerging markets, the fiscal crisis in europe and dangers within the recovery in the Us. he also discussed the impacts of the Basel III banking accord on lending and how this may impact the availability of trade finance.
He was followed by daniel schmand. he discussed how the crisis and regulatory changes had increased the capital requirements of banks and looked at the implications of Basel II and III on banks offering trade finance. he said that by offering alternative trade finance solutions, providers such as the Falcon Group played a crucial role in emerging market corporate finance.
The last speaker was a client of Falcon Group – the CFO of a well known regional corporation. he spoke about how the company’s funding gap increasingly widened during the global economic crisis due to the fact that traditional funding sources had dried up. This meant that the services provided by Falcon Group were critical in allowing the company to keep trading through the financial crisis of 2007-2009.
The forum was closed by Falcon Group chairman Kamel Alzarka.