Insights

The Strait of Hormuz doesn't have to close to change global trade; it only has to look like it might. When it does, the cost travels inland into freight, energy, and delayed cargoes, reaching firms far from the Gulf. Marine and war risk cover, political and trade risk insurance, and supply chain finance keep the trade behind the chokepoint moving, turning a closure or diversion into an insured event rather than an unhedged loss.

When the United States imposes a tariff, the cost rarely stops at the border. It moves down the supply chain into every product that uses the taxed input, provokes retaliation from the partners it targets, and leaves lenders and buyers holding contracts whose economics changed after the deal was signed. With U.S. metals tariffs at 50 percent and the USMCA review unresolved, the hard part is no longer pricing the tariff but financing through the uncertainty around it. Trade cr

When a company imports equipment, the hardest part is rarely the loan. It is the deposit, or full payment, the vendor demands before shipping. Advance payment insurance, assigned to the bank, turns that risky cross-border prepayment into secured, financeable collateral. How lenders and buyers can keep these deals moving.