Deutsche Bank wins global GTR Leaders in Trade for ESG award

It was all smiles in London on 3 May 2023 when a delighted Deutsche Bank Trade Finance team (pictured below) collected the prestigious global GTR Leaders in Trade award for ESG trophy at the packed GTR Charity Awards dinner.

Pivotal to the judges’ decision-making were the bank’s groundbreaking ESG-related trade and supply chain finance programmes across the world. In addition, the bank’s overall milestone of having outperformed the €200bn target of ESG-related financing and investment volumes in 2022 was a contributing factor.

Commenting on the win, Lavinia Bauerochse, Global Head of ESG Corporate Bank at Deutsche Bank reflected, “Winning the global GTR Leaders in Trade award for ESG is a great recognition of our continuous advances in partnering with our clients on their ESG journey and facilitating the decarbonisation of their business models.”

These incentivise suppliers to improve the sustainability of their operations and make significant progress towards their ESG goals by rewarding strong ESG rating scores with preferential discount rates on corporate receivables. Programmes that impressed the judges were:

• Henkel AG & Co. KGaA (Henkel)‘s supply chain finance programme. This was Europe’s first ever conversion of an existing supply chain finance programme in Europe to a sustainability-linked programme and was set up to create a strong incentive for Henkel’s suppliers to become more sustainable. In addition to the environmental component (“E”), the programme also takes into account social aspects (“S”) and good corporate governance (“G”).
• Knorr-Bremse’s expansion of its existing SCF programme with Deutsche Bank, announced in December 2022, to reward its suppliers for more sustainable business practices.

“We are thrilled to be playing such a key role in helping our clients move their supply chains to be more sustainable. And we are committed to support those suppliers that are willing to undergo and commit to the necessary due diligence to make ESG-linked programmes a long term and continuing success,” said Christina Gnad, Global Head Working Capital and Regional Head, Trade & Lending Americas.

A trade finance transaction with ESG-related outcomes that contributed to the win included an export finance deal with the UK export credit agency, UKEF:

• Ankara-Izmir High Speed Railway: Deutsche Bank acted as mandated lead arranger for the financing of the Ankara-Izmir High Speed Railway, a project which involved the construction of a high-speed railway between Ankara and Izmir in the Republic of Turkey. The new high-speed railway line will provide a low-carbon method of transportation, improve efficiency of transport between Ankara and Izmir, create job opportunities, and support tourism.

Atul Jain, Global Co-Head of Trade Finance & Lending at Deutsche Bank concluded, “This win recognises the tremendous efforts made to place sustainability at the core of how we approach client solutioning and innovation across our global Trade Finance & Lending product complex."

Left to right at Deutsche Bank:

Anna Elliott (Structured Trade and Export Finance, UK); Sapna Sapra (Head of Structured Trade and Export Finance, UK); Isin Karahan (Head of Distribution Europe); Danai Koutra, (Head of Natural Resources Finance, London); Clarissa Dann (Editorial Director, Marketing); and Tim de Lange (Natural Resources Finance, Netherlands); Far right, Peter Gubbins, Founder and CEO GTR.