team spirit - Bankier.pl

Network bank
for international
corporates
International Corporates and Special Finance
Multinational Corporates
For the past twelve years BA-CA has implemented its crossborder
relationship management principle to meet the needs
of multinational corporates. By utilising regional expertise and
the local presence of our CEE banking subsidiaries, highly
qualified staff with an international background and sophisticated
market knowledge provide tailor-made network solutions
for the most diverse requirements of large companies.
The group relationship manager in Vienna is the single point
of contact for all the customer’s needs. This strategy is highly
valued by customers, as reflected in an independent customer
survey: customers commended the bank’s quick and uncomplicated
solutions for complex problems as well as the bank’s
strong network.
Our international A/CEE Desks are located in the major financial
centres of Western Europe, America and Asia and provide
internationally active companies both with contacts at BA-CA
in Austria and CEE as well as support in the respective countries
and assistance in all transactions with Central and Eastern
Europe.
In order to maintain our high quality standards, the department
was restructured in 2005: to provide integrated relationship
management our three customer service centres now deal
with day-to-day business in Austria in addition to fulfilling
their group relationship management function. Units in the
federal provinces outside Vienna serve as points of contact for
customers.
In 2005, thanks to newly acquired customers and to growth
rates in business in the CEE markets, we were again able to
improve the results in business with multinational corporates
throughout the Group.
Trade Finance, Cash Management
and Financial Institutions
Bank Austria Creditanstalt’s Trade Finance division offers customers
a selection of hedging and financing instruments as
well as cash management products for their foreign trade
activities. The product departments of the Trade Finance division
benefit from the close cooperation with the Financial
Institutions unit, which is responsible for meeting the needs of
banks and foreign governments.
Over the past years Bank Austria Creditanstalt has set up local
trade finance units within all banking subsidiaries in CEE. While
64 International Corporates and Special Finance
attending to the requirements of local customers, the specialists
assigned to these units, together with BA-CA, also assist
international corporate customers with their trade finance
transactions and offer them cash management services.
In the area of international export and trade finance, the
positive development of important export markets of Austrian
companies in 2005 led to stronger demand for financing services
in countries such as Russia, Romania and Kazakhstan.
Large-volume financing transactions were concluded above all
for the steel industry and the infrastructure sector. We also
succeeded in expanding our customer base in the area of
commodities financing through our product expertise and the
availability of our network in the traditional commodities markets
in the CIS and in CEE.
Accompanied by the local trade finance units of the BA-CA
Group which are supported by the CEE Desk in Vienna,
exporters in CEE countries are in the process of capturing
international markets. For example, in 2005 Bank Austria
Creditanstalt concluded major buyer financing transactions for
exports from Slovenia and Slovakia to Russia, and from the
Czech Republic to Ukraine.
The trend towards large-volume transactions in documentary
business and guarantees continued in 2005. This was for
example reflected in an over 11% increase in turnover in letters
of credit to more than € 3.5 bn. Turnover in foreign guarantees
jumped by 22 % to about € 2.8 bn. The development
of the bank’s documentary business indicates that China is
becoming one of Austria’s most important trading partners.
As a traditional gateway for companies expanding into new
markets, the International Cash Management unit once
again recorded a sharp rise in the number of cash management
requests from Austrian and foreign customers in 2005.
In response to customer needs, BA-CA expanded the functions
and regional availability of its cash management services: taking
into account the respective legal requirements, BA-CA
now offers local and international cash management services
across its CEE network. In this context the experts in Vienna
coordinate the requests covering a number of countries.