Easter Greetings

Coface wishes a Happy Easter to all its Clients and Business Partners.
We wish you an enjoyable Spring Break.

The ongoing turmoil in the financial markets offers opportunities to win business for companies trading on credit. Companies should however, ensure their cash flow is well protected. Over the last few years the value of offering trade credit has not been fully recognised, as most companies have benefited from strong cash flow. The true benefits of credit have been undervalued. Furthermore the risks attached to trading on credit have been clouded by a benign economic environment and a low level of business failures. However, things are now changing.

Trade credit is even more valuable now. Businesses can take the opportunity to use it to win business but with the current uncertainty in the financial markets and potential for economic prospects to deteriorate, businesses should review their credit management controls and look for ways of protecting and enhancing their cash flow.

Coface has teamed up with Guru Online to offer video based business advice on how to use credit management as a strategic tool, covering such subjects as to why it is necessary to protect bad debts, why the ledger is an important asset, how to protect export debts and what businesses should look for in choosing an insurer.

Additional advice is also available on how invoice discounting and factoring work and their potential benefits as a source of finance.

More than half of UK exporters (55%) would vote in favour of the UK joining the single currency and nearly two thirds (63%) have backed calls for a referendum on the UK joining the single currency.

This is one of the main findings of the Coface sponsored Export Survey 2007, a survey of UK exporters carried out by the Credit Management Research Centre, at Leeds University Business School.

@rating Expert Reports – 2 valuable enhancements available now.

In line with our aim to provide the most comprehensive commercial credit information we have added 2 further indicators to our @rating Expert Reports.

The Payment Behaviour Gauge indicates how fast a company may pay its creditors based on all payment information available and is assessed for recency and relevance to company size.

The Financial Stress Indicator is a calculation which indicates the odds of a trading entity encountering financial stress.