NEW SOURCE OF FINANCE FOR SMALL AND MID-SIZED COMPANIES

Ebury’s Trade Finance service will help companies trade in the UK and overseas

An innovative new source of short-term finance for small and mid-sized companies was launched by Ebury, the London-headquartered financial services company that helps businesses trade and grow.

Trade Finance has been launched following feedback from Ebury’s clients, who include more than 3,000 small to medium companies. They say that banks remain reluctant to provide finance – even to well-managed growing companies – highlighting a gap in the market.

This insight chimes with the Bank of England’s latest Trends in Lending publication, published in April 2014. It shows that lending to small and medium-sized businesses remains depressed, and highlights the potential for non-bank financial services, such as Ebury, to fill the gap.

Trade Finance provides short-term credit to help companies pay for goods from suppliers – up to a value of £500,000, for up to 120 days. It’s provided with a managed service to help them use it effectively.

As well as the financing itself, Trade Finance can offer tactical advantages to companies. By allowing them to pay in cash up front, it can help them secure better terms. Its short-term financing is especially valuable for companies that face seasonal peaks in demand, around summer or Christmas for example.

Importers can particularly benefit because Trade Finance integrates with Ebury’s other established services, including competitive foreign exchange, emerging market currency expertise, hedging and international payments. Together, these provide an end-to-end payment solution that is easy to use – in more than 100 currencies.

Salvador Garcia Andres, CEO of Ebury, said: “This is the right service at the right time, providing finance when the banks are still retrenching. We speak to ambitious small and mid-sized companies every day when they use our international payments and competitive foreign exchange services, and can clearly see the need for short-term finance.

“Our Trade Finance product is specifically designed to give companies advantages in business. As well as helping them to complete transactions, they can use up-front cash payment to negotiate better terms. Because it integrates with our competitive foreign exchange and payment services, Trade Finance can also help companies make international transactions in more than 100 currencies.

“Ebury is all about using expertise to empower small and mid-size companies that want to grow and compete internationally. Trade Finance is another service that can help them do so.”

Trade Finance is valuable to a wide range of industry sectors. Ebury has used its longstanding relationships and industry knowledge to identify sectors where the service will be particularly valuable. These include:

• Fashion and Textiles – e.g. outdoor equipment, sportswear, shoes, jewellery and watches
• Furniture – e.g. home and garden, decoration items and home-ware
• Electronics – e.g. consumer, industrial and automotive

About Trade Finance

Trade Finance has been launched to provide short-term finance to small and mid-size companies. There are no fees. Companies that are accepted as clients simply pay interest on the finance they use. Rates depend on company circumstances and the nature of the transaction being financed, but are typically a flat 3% for the first 30 days, then a rate of 1.5% for each subsequent 30 days charged pro-rata to reflect the number of days the finance is used for. The maximum period is 120 days. For full details of the service, see: https://www.ebury.com/services/#trade-finance

About Ebury

Ebury is a London based financial services company specifically designed to empower small and medium-sized businesses that want to trade internationally.

Using Ebury’s integrated financial services, small and mid-size companies can make and receive payments in foreign currencies, enjoy better exchange rates, use emerging-market currencies, hedge currency risk, benefit from liquidity, and finance transactions in more than 100 currencies – quickly and easily with a managed service.

With offices in London, Madrid and Amsterdam, Ebury is one of the UK’s fastest-growing financial services companies, employs 170 people and is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. For more information, visit www.ebury.com