Last updated: 04 Aug, 2026, 2:55 PM
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Updates: Navigating rules, policy and the digital future of trade finance, ICC United Kingdom
Deepesh Patel
Editor in Chief, Trade Treasury Payments
Published 3 Mar 2026
Developing Story
Developing story
Live Updates
4 updates
UPDATE
Live now: What does the Digital Assets Act mean for trade finance?In a conversation about The Digital Assets Act (DAA) and the Electronic Trade Documents Act (ETDA), we heard experts discussing the current legal frameworks aimed at digitalising documentary trade processes, enabling tokenisation and automating settlement for 60% of global trade finance. What is the Electronic Trade Documents Act (ETDA)?ETDA allows specified electronic trade documents (including bills of lading) to have the same legal effect as paper, provided they meet statutory reliability criteria.This was necessary because instruments like bills of exchange historically relied on possession of paper. Section 72 of the Bills of Exchange Act 1882 defines a bill as an unconditional order in writing. That “in writing” requirement reinforced the paper paradigm and complicated electronic issuance, acceptance and endorsement.ETDA disapplies that constraint for qualifying electronic trade documents, allowing digital issuance, acceptance and endorsement with equivalent legal effect.What is the Property (Digital Assets etc) Act?The Digital Assets Act is broader. It confirms that digital or electronic assets are not prevented from being personal property merely because they are intangible.It does not create a new asset class but clarifies that digital assets can attract proprietary rights, which is relevant for transfer, security and insolvency.In short, ETDA addresses the document-level issue (digital bills, issuance, acceptance and endorsement), while the 2025 Act strengthens the wider legal foundation for tokenised and digital-native assets in trade finance.On the panel:
- Moderator: Sean Edwards, SMBC and Chair, ITFA
- Prof Sarah Green, University of Bristol and Newmans Row
- Paul Landless, DLA Piper
- Jon Boran, Lloyds Bank
- Duncan Lodge, Bank of America
Trade Treasury Payments are delighted to be media partners at the ICC United Kingdom half-day trade finance conference: Navigating rules, policy and the digital future of trade finance.
UPDATE
Swift – The cost of fragmentation could cost: $2.8 trillion, 2.6% global GDP
How do we solve the underlying data challenges we currently face to truly scale digital trade by 2030?
In a mission to address accelerated fragmentation and continued digital island problems, we heard updates from the EBRD, ADB and Swift at the ICC United Kingdom half-day conference – Navigating rules, policy and the digital future of trade finance.
Different approaches, from focusing on the 140 companies generating digital trade documents such as invoices, to exploring how corporate-to-bank APIs, to reframing discussions around sustainability and digital identity. Swift concluded, in a report with Economist Impact in January 2025, that the cost of global financial fragmentation, is expected to globally cost $2.8 trillion or 2.6% of GDP. If the negative trend escalates (doubles), the cost could be $6.5 trillion.
On the panel:
- Moderator: Brendan Vickers, Policy Director, ICC United Kingdom
- Irina Tyan, Associate Director in the Trade Facilitation Programme, EBRD
- Oswald Kuyler, Senior Digital Trade Advisor, ADB
- Lawrence Freeborn, Industry, Insights & Intelligence, Swift
UPDATE
ICC Banking Commisson updates – Commission and UK
Updates from the ICC Banking Commission. On a panel, TTP Global Advisory Panel member, Tomasch Kubiak, International Chamber of Commerce, provided updates from the ICC Banking Commission.
- Making trade finance cheaper, faster and simpler, and promoting trade finance through clarification of market practice, clear standards, clear rules and clear definitions.
- Clarification across sustainability, digitalisation, and guidance on crime, risk and regulation.
- Repeated messaging to regulators that restricting trade finance restricts the ability to finance the real economy, with ICC’s biggest asset being the provision of hard and sound data via the ICC Trade Register.
- Increasing partnership and membership to achieve bigger representation in the data and stronger representativity of ICC members, including countries from the Global South.
- Cooperation with development banks, DFIs and UN agencies, leveraging ICC’s UN observer status.
- Ongoing projects including MLETR-related work, negotiable electronic cargo documents, API work with SWIFT, and continued reliance on national committees (notably ICC UK) to drive the agenda, with meetings scheduled in Paris and again in November in the UK.
On the panel:
- Moderator: Chris Southworth, Secretary General, ICC United Kingdom
- Emmanuelle Butaud-Stubbs, Secretary General, ICC France
- Tomasch Kubiak, Policy Manager, ICC Banking Commission
- Krishnan Ramadurai,Update on Regulatory Advocacy Working Group (GCD)
- Maria Mogilnaya, Update on Commercialisation Working Group (CargoX)
- Kaushika Ruwangalia (HSBC)
UPDATE
DP
Deepesh Patel
Editor in Chief
The ICC United Kingdom trade finance conference is now underway, with chair, Parvaiz Dalal and Brendan Vickers introducing the half-day conference at DLA Piper, London, exploring the regulatory, policy and digital developments transforming the industry.
Trade Treasury Payments are delighted to be media partners of this conference.
