At this year’s Sibos conference in Frankfurt, Germany, Trade Finance Global (TFG) asked attendees and speakers how they would summarise this year’s Sibos conference in one word.
Of the slightly longer answers, we were told:
“This is probably the most important Sibos exhibition since the financial crisis” – Dirk Besdziek, Commerzbank
“We want to see how we can unlock the next frontiers of finance” – Avanee Gokhale, Swift
“It’s about finding your long-lost friends again; it’s where the industry comes together; it’s a community of us meeting again” – Kai Fehr, HSBC
The most popular responses were: Connections, innovation, and fantastic. With around 12,000 attendees this year, the value of networking was transparent – but also, connections refers to cross-sector partnerships, and the value of organisations with differing priorities coming together to make the industry more inclusive. Working to build a trade ecosystem that best serves all parties involved is ultimately the purpose of the industry uniting.
Similarly, innovation in trade, trade finance, and payments came up consistently over the conference. We discussed tokenisation within securitisation in payments, trade finance as an investable asset class, and many more ways the industry is adapting around new and persistent challenges to it. Especially in the technology domain, innovation is front and centre of everyone’s minds in preparing for ‘the next frontier’.
And ‘fantastic’ speaks for itself.
Here’s how everyone responded:
- Transformative
- Progress
- Partnership
- AI integration
- Resilience
- Scale
- Digital currency
- Transition
- The place to be
- Stupendous
- Fun
- Buzzing together
- Uncertain, but cautiously optimistic
- Relationships
- Making new friends
- Solutions for the future
- Global community in Frankfurt
- The future
- Technology
- Exhilarating
- Exciting
- Globalisation
Our Sibos magazine touches on these themes, and discusses whether global finance is entering a new frontier.
