For ICBA's global team, when implementing long-term trade credit insurance solutions, winning isn’t everything; competing is

By Rob Downey

A successful NCAA Division I and U.S. Olympic men’s basketball coach is reputed to have said, "I don’t recruit winners." Instead, he looked for the competitive kid, the one who indicated a willingness to prepare daily for a chance to succeed at a more intense challenge than any previously experienced.

If you have learned nothing else in coming through the global financial downturn, you have learned at least what the famous coach implied: "winners" are a dime a dozen. That is, many of the people in your purview – whether peers, supervisors, clients, lenders, or underwriters – were winners in 2007, i.e., they were at their best when times were good. Some of these erstwhile winners were probably “found out” during the 2008-09 crisis, uncovered by the advent of hardening circumstances.

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Esteem for the art of credit diligence and the price of risk mitigation are bound to rise together

By Rob Downey

Some say the "fairy tale" of global finance has ended badly; others say the unhappy endings have not yet played out. Whatever the painful details still to come in the epilogue, we know very few companies will get to "The End" unscathed, and that all the surviving characters will eventually start a new story under new rules in the near future. Two aspects of credit insurance and trade finance will likely be changed for the better once we embark upon a fresh new narrative.

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