Lloyds Bank partners Enigio to boost trade finance digitisation
Lloyds Bank and Stockholm-based data technology company Enigio have partnered to develop the use of digital documentation in trade finance using blockchain technology.
Lloyds Bank MD for lending and working capital, Gwynne Master
The pair will widen the number of use cases for Enigio’s trace:original solution for digital original documents, including promissory notes, bills of exchange and bills of lading.
The trace:original solution enables the creation of digital documents that can be used in processes where an ‘original’ document is required.
The partnership will also explore opportunities to feature trace:original documents within wider trade finance products, such as documentary collections and credits.
By doing away with the need to physically transfer documentation in trade transactions, Lloyds Bank says it can make them faster, more affordable, flexible, sustainable and secure.
Lloyds Bank managing director for lending and working capital, Gwynne Master, says that compared to digital documentation, existing industry-wide trade solutions are “much slower, more cumbersome and more environmentally intensive”, involving upwards of 28 billion pieces of paper globally every year.
Lloyds Bank’s work with Enigio is part of its ongoing digital strategy and paperless trade initiative and follows its successful completion in August 2022 of the UK’s first transaction utilising a digital promissory note purchase.
