Economy
MasterCard Track to Make Ease of Doing Business Easier
By Dipo Olowookere
A new innovation has been introduced by leading payment platform, MasterCard, to make ease of doing business easier.
The new initiative called MasterCard Track™ was launched on Wednesday, September 12, 2018 in collaboration with Microsoft.
Track is a unique global trade platform that will simplify and enhance how companies around the world do business with each other.
While parts of the B2B process have been digitized, large and costly gaps still remain, an estimated $500 billion in annual administrative costs and rising. These costs are added to the inefficiency of the nearly half of all global business transactions, $58 trillion, that are still done in paper.
MasterCard Track will address these fundamental challenges by further streamlining and automating the procure-to-pay-process – enabling businesses to manage business identity, compliance and payments in a more efficient way.
“While there have been great improvements and innovations in the way consumers pay, the global B2B space remains highly inefficient and paper-based”, said Michael Froman, vice chairman and president of strategic growth at MasterCard. “This adds hundreds of billions of dollars of costs and burdensome delays to global trade. MasterCard Track is a tool that will help reduce frictions in the global trading system and promote increased exports – especially by small and medium-sized businesses.”
Unlocking growth for businesses of all sizes
While consumers have become accustomed to a broader choice of technology solutions, businesses too are looking for speed, security and convenience in their everyday operations. From reducing the steps it takes to identify a business partner, to making the payments process simpler and more transparent, MasterCard Track has the potential to unlock economic growth and to level the playing field for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME).
“Together with MasterCard, we’re helping companies around the world accelerate the pace of their own transformation by creating a more efficient buying and selling process at scale,” said Peggy Johnson, executive vice president, Microsoft. “By building MasterCard Track on Azure, MasterCard will be able to take advantage of our stringent security and compliance standards, our global footprint and our intelligent cloud solutions to help organizations of all sizes drive value from the back-office to the front of the enterprise.”
MasterCard Track underscores the company’s commitment to address several pain points in the global business environment. The new platform draws on and complements the whole range of MasterCard innovation and B2B assets, from account-to-account and card payment solutions to fraud management, data analytics and payment gateway services.
Addressing identity, compliance and payment management needs
Initially, MasterCard is partnering with nine B2B networks and procure-to-pay solution providers – Basware, BirchStreet, Coupa, the Infor GT Nexus Commerce Network, Ivalua, Jaggaer, Liaison Technologies, Tradeshift and Tungsten Network – representing a wide range of global businesses, to roll out Track’s identity, compliance and payment management capabilities to buyers and suppliers.
Beginning in early 2019, customers of these organizations will be able to maintain, retrieve and exchange key information relating to themselves and their trading partners through the Track Trade Directory, a secure, permissioned repository of over 150 million company registrations worldwide. This central directory will integrate feeds from more than 4,500 compliance lists into one place, making the screening and onboarding of suppliers more efficient.
As the platform expands, suppliers will have better visibility into cash flow – when they can expect to get paid and for how much – across multiple networks. Track will help connect all types of payments – account-based, card-based or bank transfer – within the platform, while also connecting purchase order and invoice information. This will streamline and simplify back-office reconciliation, one of the largest burdens facing businesses today.
Through its partners, Track will enable B2B networks, banks, insurance companies and technology providers to extend value-added services to business customers, such as enhanced data analytics and trade finance.
Integrated with Singapore’s National Trade Platform
In Singapore, MasterCard Track has already been integrated with the National Trade Platform, a one-stop digital trade ecosystem which brings together key logistics functions, such as movement of goods as well as regulatory and financial elements for players across the trade value chain. MasterCard Track facilitates secure and efficient electronic payments between buyers and suppliers, helping to strengthen the country’s position as the leading trading hub for the region.
By Dipo Olowookere
The selling pressure on the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited persisted on Thursday, causing a further decline of 0.61 per cent.
Data from Customs Street showed that the insurance counter lost 2.46 per cent, the banking space declined by 2.15 per cent, the industrial goods sector crumbled by 1.00 per cent, the energy index fell by 0.23 per cent, and the consumer goods segment crashed by 0.08 per cent.
As a result, the All-Share Index (ASI) retreated by 1,368.10 points to 224,321.97 points from 225,690.07 points, and the market capitalisation moderated by N878 billion to N143.947 trillion from N144.825 trillion.
Trading data indicated investors bought and sold 855.4 million shares for N28.4 billion in 51,609 deals versus the 488.1 million shares worth N14.0 billion traded in 46,929 deals on Wednesday, showing a spike in the trading volume, value, and number of deals by 75.25 per cent, 102.86 per cent, and 9.97 per cent, respectively.
The busiest stock for the session was Sterling Holdings, with a turnover of 459.6 million units worth N3.7 billion, Zenith Bank exchanged 41.2 million units for N4.2 billion, Universal Insurance sold 30.2 million units valued at N25.2 million, Access Holdings traded 29.7 million units worth N654.9 million, and FCMB transacted 28.2 million units valued at N271.4 million.
Yesterday, 13 equities gained weight, while 34 equities shed weight, indicating a negative market breadth index and weak investor sentiment.
Guinea Insurance lost 10.00 per cent to trade at 90 Kobo, International Energy Insurance slipped by 9.84 per cent to N5.22, The Initiates dropped 9.79 per cent to close at N23.50, Tantalizers declined by 9.52 per cent to N3.61, and NEM Insurance crashed by 9.25 per cent to N28.12.
On the flip side, Austin Laz gained 10.00 per cent to close at N3.63, Learn Africa also improved by 10.00 per cent to N9.90, DAAR Communications appreciated by 9.49 per cent to N1.50, UPDC soared by 9.09 per cent to N3.60, and Caverton flew higher by 8.51 per cent to N5.10.
By Adedapo Adesanya
The Naira continued to gain ground against the US Dollar in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEX), as it further chalked up N2.26 or 0.16 per cent to sell for N1,370.15/$1 on Thursday, July 2, in contrast to Wednesday’s rate of N1,372.41/$1.
However, this was not the case for the domestic currency against the Pound Sterling at the same market window, the official market. It lost N10.44 to close at N1,832.17/£1 versus the previous day’s N1,821.73/£1, and fell against the Euro by N2.91 to trade at N1,568.28/€1 compared with the N1,565.37/€1 it was traded at midweek.
But at the black market, the Nigerian Naira gained N5 against the US Dollar yesterday to quote at N1,390/$1 versus the preceding session’s N1,395/$1, and at the GTBank FX counter, it appreciated by N7 to settle at N1,382/$1 versus N1,389/$1.
There are expectations that the Naira will remain within range as pressure from people taking half-year profits has tapered down while continued stronger policy signals from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) back the market.
Data from the apex bank showed that interbank FX turnover declined to $85.517 million across 94 deals closed by financial institutions trading on behalf of their clients from $90.303 million the previous day.
The last two trading sessions have seen a sharp decline in interbank FX turnover, down from an intra-week high of $269.898 million, according to data obtained from the CBN.
Despite a sharp slowdown in CBN FX intervention, the broader expectation remains that the Naira will trade within a relatively stable range through the remainder of 2026.
As for the cryptocurrency market, a squeeze on bearish traders pushed Bitcoin (BTC) toward $62,000, capping the market’s first genuinely strong week since mid June. It improved its value by 1.8 per cent to $61,644.94.
Data from Coinglass showed that traders betting against crypto lost $281 million to liquidations over the past 24 hours, against $159 million in longs, out of $440 million in total forced closures across 95,690 traders.
Cardano (ADA) rose by 6.6 per cent to $0.1651, Ethereum (ETH) soared by 5.5 per cent to $1,716.65, Ripple (XRP) appreciated by 4.2 per cent to $1.10, Dogecoin (DOGE) grew by 3.3 per cent to $0.0751, Solana (SOL) also chalked up 3.3 per cent to sell at $80.95, Binance Coin (BNB) added 2.0 per cent to close at $562.22, and TRON (TRX) jumped by 1.0 per cent to $0.3186, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) remained unchanged at $1.00 each.
By Aduragbemi Omiyale
The gantry price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), otherwise known as petrol, has been cut down by Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals by N50 to N1,075 per litre from N1,125 per litre.
The company announced this reduction in a statement on Thursday, saying this move was to make the product available to consumers at lower prices.
The refinery explained that petroleum product pricing cannot mirror daily movements in international crude oil markets because crude is purchased weeks, and sometimes months, before it is processed.
According to the refinery, the petroleum products currently being supplied to the market are being produced from crude inventories acquired during periods of substantially higher prices.
It disclosed that the average landed cost of crude processed stood at approximately $124.80 per barrel in May and $95.25 per barrel in June, compared with the current international benchmark of about $71.01 per barrel.
The Lagos-based refinery also clarified that its crude procurement costs are not based solely on the headline ICE Brent benchmark commonly quoted in the media.
Rather, crude is purchased on a Dated Brent basis together with applicable market premiums, freight and logistics costs, resulting in actual feedstock costs that differ materially from benchmark prices.
Despite the sharp increase in crude acquisition costs during the period, Dangote Refinery said it deliberately refrained from transferring the full impact to consumers, choosing instead to absorb a significant portion of the additional costs in order to support market stability and cushion Nigerians from the volatility in global energy markets.
“[The latest] N50 per litre reduction is the fourth price cut in one month, bringing cumulative reductions to above N200 per litre on PMS. This approach ensures that pricing decisions are anchored on actual production economics and inventory costs rather than short-term fluctuations in international oil markets,” it said.
“Nigeria today benefits from the stabilising role of domestic refining capacity. The Dangote Petroleum Refinery currently supplies volumes sufficient to meet national demand, helping to strengthen energy security, eliminate dependence on imports, conserve foreign exchange and provide greater price stability for consumers and businesses,” it added.
The company expressed confidence that if international crude prices remain favourable and lower-cost feedstock continues to replace higher-priced inventories, Nigerians should expect further moderation in petroleum product prices.
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