Standard Bank

Culture and digital evolve eco-synergies in African banking

Standard Bank has joined the powerful R3 network of over 75 global financial services players to enhance their exploration into blockchain solutions.

SnapScan is used by hundreds of thousands of customers, at a national network of more than 32 000 physical and online merchants.

Custodian banks of today in the African markets have evolved from being passive, reactive players in the market to proactive and driving forces in market changes.

Corporates remain ever-interested in high growth emerging markets. Currently a large number of the world’s high-growth emerging markets are in Africa.

There is still interest from multinational companies to expand into Africa due to the higher growth rates on offer than elsewhere in the world, but expectations around more sophisticated solutions are much higher than they were in the past.

The app allows account holders to view balances and transaction history on a smartphone, and also make cross-currency payments between their Standard Bank accounts.

Standard Bank Group, Africa’s leading bank by assets, collected 22 awards in the EMEA Finance’s Treasury Services Awards and Global Finance’s World’s Best Bank Awards, both for 2015. The awards were presented at the Sibos conference in Singapore.

Standard Bank has appointed Jonathan Peake to the role of Chief Financial Officer with responsibility for the Finance and Treasury teams across the group’s offshore business in Jersey, Isle of Man and Mauritius.

Greater levels of trade will fuel Africa’s growth but companies need to be better positioned to seize the opportunities by improving their working capital management capabilities and access to finance to fund these opportunities, says Standard Bank.

According to the African Development Bank’s recent report on trade finance in Africa, the conservative estimate for the value of unmet demand for bank-intermediated trade finance is between US$110 billion and US $120 billion, which is significantly higher than earlier estimated figures of US$25 billion.