Handing over the baton: Sian Aspinall, former Group CEO, BPL
At Trade Treasury Payments Studios, Deepesh Patel, Editor-in-Chief at Trade Treasury Payments (TTP), spoke with Sian Aspinall, former Group CEO of BPL, about her three-decade career in the trade credit insurance market and the changes she has witnessed across the industry.
From a flamboyant London market to a modern credit insurance industry
Aspinall first entered the London insurance market in the early 1990s, at a time when Lloyd’s of London was at its height, while at the same time undergoing structural change. For newcomers, the environment could feel overwhelming.
Aspinall said, “You kind of felt, as a junior broker, that you were just parachuted into this parallel universe that you were really struggling to put your feet under.”
The market was steeped in tradition and personality. Hundreds of syndicates operated within Lloyd’s, and the culture carried a distinctive energy shaped by strong characters and longstanding rituals.
“It really had an energy and a life and a colour that was unlike anything I’d ever experienced before,” Aspinall said.
While the sector has since become more professionalised, with greater reliance on analytics, systems, and formalised processes, Aspinall believes something intangible may have been lost along the way, saying, “There’s a creativity that comes from that flamboyance and that theatrical air, and I sometimes worry that we’ve taken some of that colour out of the equation.”
How regulation reshaped the credit insurance market
Over the course of Aspinall’s career, the nature of risks insured within the trade credit and credit and political risk insurance (CPRI) market has evolved significantly.
In the early years, insurers often took on deals that banks themselves were reluctant to finance, and underwriters had to rely heavily on judgment and fundamentals when evaluating transactions.
Aspinall said, “The transactions that were being bound and considered from a risk perspective were kind of unbankable.”
However, regulatory changes later transformed the role of credit insurance within bank portfolios. Once banks were able to obtain capital relief by using insurance as an unfunded guarantee, the product became more widely adopted within structured trade finance.
“It really changed the parameters of the risks that came into the market and encouraged much more capacity,” Aspinall said.
As a result, the sector has expanded dramatically. According to the 2025 Global Survey on Credit Risk Insurance from the International Association of Credit Portfolio Managers (IACPM) and the International Trade and Forfaiting Association (ITFA), insured exposures among reporting banks alone now exceed $190 billion.
“That is just unrecognisable from the market that I walked into,” Aspinall added.
The growing importance of industry collaboration
As the market has matured, industry associations have played an increasingly important role in representing the sector’s interests. Aspinall believes organisations such as ITFA and IACPM have helped provide the credibility and coordination needed to effectively engage with regulators and policymakers.
Aspinall said, “Trade bodies are perfect at focusing on things that are for the greater good of the industry as a whole.”
Earlier in the market’s development, credit insurance transactions were largely conducted behind the scenes, protected by confidentiality clauses and limited market transparency. This made it difficult for the sector to advocate collectively or demonstrate its broader relevance.
“It was too small and too under the radar. People didn’t really talk about it, and the market suffered because of that,” Aspinall added.
Today, as the scale and relevance of credit insurance have grown, the industry’s ability to organise around shared priorities has strengthened considerably.
Leadership, culture, and diversity
Beyond regulatory and market developments, Aspinall has also been an active voice in discussions around leadership and diversity within the industry. Over the past several decades, she has seen clear progress in representation across many levels of the sector. However, she believes the pace of change has slowed at the most senior levels of leadership. Aspinall said, “Most people would say the industry has changed, but if you look up, it hasn’t changed.”
Her own approach to driving change has been shaped by experience. Rather than pushing against institutions from the outside, she believes meaningful progress often requires credibility and influence from within.
“Diverse groups make better decisions because they bring different backgrounds, different perspectives, and different experiences,” Aspinall said. “You can’t change from the outside. You have to change from the inside.”
Looking ahead
As she prepares to step away from her role at BPL, Aspinall also offered advice to professionals entering the banking and insurance sectors today. For her, one of the most valuable career assets is a trusted professional network built on genuine relationships.
“Don’t underestimate the value of a good network,” she said, “Reliable, trusted individuals you can lean on for advice.”
Such networks, she explained, provide both support and confidence during difficult career decisions.
Ultimately, however, Aspinall hopes that the most enduring part of her legacy will be the culture she helped to sow. “Culture comes from the top,” Aspinall said, “how you treat people, how you work, and whether you create a meritocracy.”
As leadership passes to her successor, she hopes that spirit continues to guide the organisation and the wider industry she has helped shape for more than three decades.
Prefer to listen? The full conversation is also available as a podcast below.
Key Topics
- Evolution of trade credit and political risk insurance
- Regulatory change and the role of capital relief
- Industry collaboration and the role of trade bodies
- Leadership, culture and diversity in financial services
- The growing influence of technology and artificial intelligence
Key Insights
Expert Analysis
Sian Aspinall offers a grounded and experience-led view of how trade credit and political risk insurance has changed over the past three decades. When she entered the market, it was a niche and often opaque space, dealing largely with risks that banks were unwilling to take on. Decisions relied heavily on judgement, relationships and a deep understanding of country and sector dynamics. Over time, regulatory developments reshaped the landscape. The ability for banks to achieve capital relief through insurance products brought a broader and more structured flow of transactions into the market. What was once considered unbankable became increasingly mainstream, and the scale of activity grew significantly as a result. Despite these advances, Aspinall points to a trade-off. The market has become more professional, more data driven and more systematised, but some of the energy and entrepreneurial thinking that once defined it may have faded. She suggests that creativity and commercial instinct remain important, particularly in a sector that still deals with complex and often unpredictable risks. She also highlights the importance of industry bodies in giving the market a stronger, more unified voice. As the sector has grown, organisations such as ITFA and IACPM have helped bridge gaps between participants and regulators, creating a more coherent framework for growth. On leadership, Aspinall is clear that progress has been made, particularly around diversity, but that change at senior levels remains slow. She stresses that credibility and influence come from working within the system and building trust over time. Looking ahead, she sees artificial intelligence as an important area to watch. While its full impact is still uncertain, it is likely to reshape how value is delivered, particularly in broking. Firms that can clearly demonstrate their relevance in this changing environment will be best placed to succeed.— Sian Aspinall
Key Findings
- Trade credit insurance has developed into a more established and widely used financial solution
- Regulation has played a decisive role in shaping both growth and participation
- Industry bodies have helped bring greater alignment and visibility to the sector
- Progress on diversity is evident, but leadership representation still lags behind
- Technology is set to influence how the market operates, though its full impact is still emerging
Implications
- Closer alignment between banks and insurers will continue to shape how risk is distributed
- Brokers will need to clearly define and demonstrate their value as technology advances
- Maintaining a balance between structure and commercial creativity will be important
- Collaboration across the industry will remain essential as regulation evolves
- Greater diversity at senior levels will be key to improving decision making and long term performance
Key Takeaways
- The market has expanded significantly as a result of regulatory and structural change
- Insurance has become an important tool for improving capital efficiency and supporting trade
- Building strong professional networks remains critical for career development
- Inclusive leadership is not just desirable but commercially beneficial
- The impact of artificial intelligence will be a defining theme for the next phase of the market
