Willis Towers Watson has launched a next generation version of Mercury, its successful credit risk placement platform which offers clients the ability to bind credit insurance policies themselves over an online portal.
Originally developed in the 1990s, the concept was moved by Willis to a web platform called Mercury in 2004. It offers banks and now corporates, instantaneous access to their chosen credit insurers. Willis Towers Watson clients can use Mercury to easily and securely place a credit risk insurance transaction.
In addition, Mercury provides valuable management information such as quantifying in real-time a business’s exposure to certain geographies or counter-parties wherever they are in the world.
Most leading political and trade credit risk insurers are already set-up to underwrite via the Mercury platform. New markets are being added on a regular basis. Users have the option to select which underwriters they would like to use. The platform caters for the full range of trade finance activities from import and export letters of credit, trade advances, bill purchase and receivables financing.
Paul Davidson, head of Willis Towers Watson’s political and trade credit risk practice, Financial Solutions, said: “Trade finance is a sector whose lifeblood is efficiency of execution. Mercury is an interface that removes the transacting administration commonly associated with insurance in a manner that will be familiar to the front line trade finance staff within banks and corporates.”
He continued: “Security of data is paramount and Mercury has proved itself to be an extremely robust platform. Speed of execution, contractual certainty, ease of use, and breadth of application are the four cornerstones on which Mercury is built and from that comes broad market price discovery and real-time management information, supported by streamlined accounting.”
Davidson concluded: “Mercury offers trade finance departments in banks, traders and other companies the ability to transact their credit insurance efficiently. By using Mercury our clients will also benefit from enhanced visibility into their credit risk exposures worldwide, giving them a competitive edge. This represents a step change in the evolution of the credit insurance marketplace.”