Contributors: Ian Henderson , Chief Investment Officer; Eran Singh , Portfolio Manager; Nkateko Maimane (Tumi), Investment Analyst; Nozipho Zulu CA (SA) , Investment Analyst; Katlego Dunjana, Investment Analyst; Donovan Lindhorst , Head of Risk and Legal; Angela Paschalides , Legal Advisor; Abby Grabe , Junior Legal Advisor; Hasan Juma, CPA, CIPA , CEO of Alteia Capital; Munirah BinSaif , Manager, Asset Management; Kailash Soocan , Head of Operations; Muhammad Faizan Sabir – CME Qualified , Credit Risk Manager; and Abdullah Al Banayan , Asset Management Analyst.
Global supply chains are being reshaped from their point of origin. Governments are driving domestic processing, buyers are moving closer to the source, and commercial relationships are evolving alongside shifting trade flows. These developments extend far beyond logistics, directly influencing how goods are financed, processed, and brought to market.
Every trade finance transaction follows a commercial journey from producer to end buyer, providing a window into how supply chains evolve, where commercial pressures begin to emerge and how businesses adapt over time. Tracking the movement of goods across multiple markets demonstrates that supply chains rarely shift due to a single event. Instead, they evolve through thousands of incremental decisions made by producers, traders, processors, importers, and buyers responding to new regulations, shifting demand, changing trade routes, and capital availability. Financing these transactions offers a unique vantage point to observe these macro changes as they unfold.
Trade is being rebuilt at the origin
Some of the most significant shifts in global supply chains are occurring before goods ever leave their country of origin. The traditional, extractive model of exporting raw materials and adding value overseas is steadily giving way to a more localised approach. Governments are actively driving domestic processing, international buyers are investing heavily closer to the source, and supply chains are becoming deeply integrated around regional manufacturing rather than basic commodity extraction.
As Chief Investment Officer, Ian Henderson observes:
“The majority of African-origin commodities flowed to Asia in their primary form. A growing number of African governments are now placing restrictions on non-beneficiated commodities being exported, or, in some cases, total bans are imposed. The reasoning is sound, and there is a push for local communities and economies to benefit from added-value products being exported.”
For trade financiers, these regulatory shifts reshape transactions long before capital is deployed. Commodities that once moved directly from extraction to export now often pass through domestic processing phases. This structural change introduces new supply chain participants, extends operating cycles, and alters working capital requirements. Financing structures must therefore adapt to mirror this evolving commercial reality.
As supply chains grow more interconnected, navigating the balance between transparent and opaque data becomes critical. In African markets, effective trade finance relies on an intimate understanding of the unique flows, products, producers, and buyers that shape each deal. While data on climate, shipping, logistics, and local pricing has become highly accessible, structural challenges around credit histories, security registries, and Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance persist—infrastructure gaps that fundamentally dictate how financing must be structured.
Henderson highlights this shifting landscape:
“The cocoa and coffee sectors have seen large end users getting involved in direct origination from Africa. Another observation is the number of UAE, Singaporean and Indian-owned businesses growing origin in Africa and investing in local infrastructure and processing capacity, particularly in commodities such as cocoa, cashew, pulses and spices.”
Instead of merely purchasing commodities at the port of export, global buyers are integrating backward into the supply chain through long-term sourcing partnerships, localised processing, and fixed infrastructure investments. As origin countries capture more value domestically and regional production networks mature, trade finance must increasingly support these integrated ecosystems, moving past the simple movement of raw freight.
No two supply chains move the same way
Each commodity follows its own distinct commercial rhythm, shaped by production cycles, inventory requirements, shipping patterns, and the timing of cash flows. Consequently, each requires a financing strategy designed around its underlying commercial reality instead of a rigid, off-the-shelf lending model.
Because of these unique dynamics, funding cannot simply be stamped out from a generic template. Analysing how a transaction generates liquidity is just as critical as understanding the physical asset being traded.
As Portfolio Manager Eran Singh explains:
“A key advantage of being financed by Alteia is that a bespoke approach is applied to each client’s unique supply chain.”
That principle becomes particularly evident when comparing different sectors. Agricultural transactions are dictated by harvest seasons and crop cycles. Metals often require additional value-added processing before export, while energy transactions tend to concentrate into large-scale drawdowns aligned with shipment schedules.
As Eran notes, energy financing “typically (evolves into) large-scale single drawings—circa USD 30 million—so that bulk shipping loads and more attractive margins can be accessed.” Meanwhile, food importers and distributors remain closely tied to fast-moving inventory turnover and consumer demand. Each distinct rhythm creates unique capital requirements, fundamentally dictating how facilities must be structured.
He illustrates this market dynamic using a maize trader as a case study:
“A maize trader may only require financing for nine months of the year, corresponding with the harvest season. Traditional committed overdraft facilities would continue attracting commitment fees during the remaining three months, despite no funding being required. A short-duration trade finance facility allows financing to match the borrower’s actual operating cycle.”
Eran expanded on how structuring must adapt to commercial reality:
“While the ideal financing for a client is to provide the entire working capital cycle—from funding seed all the way to the sale of the final product—Alteia focuses on post-harvest stages within each supply chain. Within that approach, characteristics such as the point of delivery to the warehouse, how standardised the commodity is, and the processing complexity all matter. Milling corn into maize meal, for example, requires substantially different expertise to monitor than simply drying and bagging corn.”
He further emphasised the importance of communication:
“For some clients, Alteia’s financing may be their first foray into the financial markets for working capital financing. The need to communicate proactively and extensively about things that previously seemed minimal—such as route changes following a shipping closure, or new transporters, vessels or sea routes—is critical. Each of these changes may have profound effects on risk management.”
Government policy can force structural shifts in supply chains overnight. Eran notes that when state regulations mandate local processing while international buyers prefer offshore alternatives, financing structures must quickly pivot geographically: “Alteia has borrowers who are multi-geography in nature and able to source the same commodity at the same harvest times from other countries, and act in accordance with the wishes of their buyers by asking Alteia to shift financing to those countries who do not have such policies.” This systemic flexibility is vital—brittle supply chains break under regulatory pressure.
Beyond traditional trade finance, emerging technologies are unlocking entirely new frameworks. Singh describes one such innovative approach: “Alteia is available to take-on complementary financing approaches with clients where trust and performance have already been evidenced. We have partnered with clients to roll-out fintech-based PO financing for mining offtakers who are located in locations so remote that only a mobile, broker-assisted [framework] is capable of delivering a [result] palatable to all parties. Where the mine is assured of PO fulfilment, the SME PO holder is assured of optimal procurement conformant to the PO, even if they do not at inception have deep procurement expertise.”
When assessing which sectors experience the most visible disruptions, Investment Analyst Katlego Dunjana observes that “metals and mining driven by commodity price volatility, agricultural processing with greater advancements in capacity restoration and improvements, and logistics and supply chain management due to geopolitical tensions” face the most significant volatility. These distinct sectoral pressures—commodity volatility, processing evolution, and logistical bottlenecks—directly dictate the adaptive financing structures required on the ground.
The financing structure, therefore, reflects the commercial reality of the underlying trade as opposed to imposing a fixed template. Far from asking borrowers to adapt to rigid structures, effective trade finance molds itself to the commercial realities of the underlying trade. Ultimately, understanding the unique rhythm of each supply chain remains fundamental to engineering facilities that support commercial activity while maintaining disciplined risk management.
Long before the numbers change
The observations discussed so far are not drawn from isolated transactions. Since 2023, Alteia has deployed more than USD 841 million across 44 borrowers operating in 12 countries, financing trade across multiple commodities, jurisdictions, and commercial environments. Taken as a whole, these transactions highlight recurring operational patterns that often emerge well before changes are reflected in financial performance.
For credit teams, the earliest indicators come to light through the day-to-day behaviour of a transaction: inventory remaining in storage for longer than expected, receivables taking additional time to convert into cash, changes in payment cycles, or delays in the movement of goods. Individually, these developments may appear operational. When analysed together, they expose how a supply chain is responding to changing commercial conditions.
Investment Analyst Nozipho Zulu explained that inventory days extending beyond the normal business cycle often indicate difficulty in finding offtakers or selling products. In agriculture, particularly, this risk is acute, as many commodities cannot be carried into the next season due to a limited shelf life. The consequences cascade through the supply chain. When buyers delay payment, trade receivables grow faster than revenue, and bad debt write-offs often increase—trends that become evident when reviewing receivables ageing reports that show significant balances outstanding beyond agreed terms. Ultimately, these collection delays create severe cash flow pressures, leading to breaches of supplier payment terms and, consequently, longer trade payable days.
Understanding those signals requires looking beyond operational metrics alone, particularly where broader economic factors add complexity. As Tumi Maimane observed:
“The most common challenges include understanding financial statements of counterparties across different jurisdictions due to information asymmetry. In some countries, financial statements are not required to be audited, which makes reconciling and validating figures difficult and often leads to repeated back-and-forth with clients. This is further complicated by differences in accounting standards, reporting quality, and timeliness of financial information.”
Sovereign and macroeconomic risks compound these challenges. Tumi also noted that lending into Africa presents challenges where sovereign credit ratings in certain jurisdictions can negatively impact the credit profiles of borrowers operating in those markets, even when the underlying business fundamentals are relatively strong. Currency volatility and macroeconomic instability also add pressure on repayment capacity and cash flow predictability.
Operating conditions also vary considerably across jurisdictions. Katlego Dunjana said that multiple factors influence transaction performance:
“The common challenges are centred around logistics, collateral management, warehouse access control as well as the effectiveness of guarantees. Repatriation of funds from particular jurisdictions remains a common challenge, especially in jurisdictions with dollar liquidity challenges. Current geopolitical developments, including the Iran-US conflict, have contributed to longer working capital cycles for many clients. Route changes and shipping delays have increased transit times, resulting in inventory being held for longer periods before reaching final destinations.”
These observations reinforce a fundamental principle: disruptions and shifts in supply chains rarely materialize all at once. Instead, they cascade gradually through operational signals, commercial behaviours, and fluctuating market conditions long before they are fully reflected in reported financial results. Recognising these early indicators allows financing decisions to proactively evolve alongside the day-to-day realities of the trade, as opposed to reacting defensively only after the outcomes become apparent.
Financing evolves alongside trade
As supply chains evolve, financing structures must evolve with them. New trade routes, longer production cycles, and changing commercial relationships require continuous adaptation, not only when facilities are structured, but throughout the life of a transaction.
From an operational perspective, this often means responding to changing logistics, documentation requirements, and transaction monitoring. The legal team observed: “Supply chains have become more dynamic, requiring greater flexibility in monitoring transactions and maintaining visibility over collateral. As trade routes evolve, maintaining regular communication with borrowers and service providers becomes increasingly important to ensure transactions continue progressing as expected. Evolving regulations, documentation requirements and cross-border considerations increasingly require financing structures that remain robust while accommodating changing commercial realities.”
Donovan Lindhorst, Head of Risk and Legal, provides the operational perspective on how this works in practice. Supply chains are now “becoming more diversified”, he says, with clients “increasingly sourcing from multiple suppliers, rerouting their shipments where necessary and making use of alternative ports to avoid disruptions and delays.” This is critical because “the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea are experiencing simultaneous instability, creating one of the most constrained shipping environments seen since the pandemic.” The cost pressures are real:
“Our borrowers are facing increased freight rates, additional war-risk surcharges, tighter vessel capacity, longer transit times, and ongoing schedule volatility. Many carriers are implementing alternative routings via the Cape of Good Hope, adding both cost and transit time to affected shipments. In certain circumstances, we may insist on an Alteia-approved logistics provider for certain clients prior to any drawdowns.”
Legal team emphasised that Alteia maintains direct and open lines of communication with its clients so that any logistics disruptions are identified as soon as possible and addressed to our satisfaction. Across all sectors and jurisdictions, the portfolio has proved to be operationally stable despite these challenges.
These operational adaptations are highly prominent in regional trade patterns, a trend clearly illustrated by the GCC-Africa corridor. ¹ Trade volume along this corridor has more than doubled since 2016, reaching USD 121 billion and expanding at an 11.3% compound annual growth rate (CAGR). While Egypt leads at USD 18.5 billion and Ethiopia boasts 18% year-on-year growth, the corridor encompasses substantial flows through South Africa (USD 15.2B), Nigeria (USD 12.8B), Kenya (USD 8.5B), Morocco (USD 5.8B), Tanzania (USD 4.5B), and Ghana (USD 3.8B)—underscoring a deep diversification of commercial partnerships across the continent.
This expansion signals a fundamental shift in trade composition. Energy and petroleum, while historically dominant, now account for 35% of total GCC-Africa corridor volume, closely trailed by food and agriculture at 28%. Construction materials, electronics, and minerals make up the remainder, reinforcing the localised processing and value-addition dynamics occurring at the transaction level.
The underlying trade finance structures have shifted in lockstep. Driven by systemic working capital stress, average payment terms for GCC importers have lengthened from 52 to 70 days as businesses proactively extend their cash-preservation windows. Concurrently, traditional letters of credit (LCs) have steadily given way to open-account trading, tumbling from 45% to 28% of total volume. Conversely, open-account structures have climbed from 25% to 42%, effectively reallocating performance risk from importers to exporters and introducing entirely new liquidity requirements.
This compressed working capital environment is further highlighted by a dual elongation of operating metrics: Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) have stretched from 48 to 62 days, while Days Payable Outstanding (DPO) have expanded from 42 to 55 days.
Digital infrastructure is accelerating this transformation. Platform adoption in GCC trade has surged from 15% to 48%, profoundly reshaping how cross-border commercial relationships are structured and managed. Concurrently, trade finance utilisation has expanded from 38% to 52%—proving that while the deployment of capital is rising, substantial headroom remains for market entry.
The total addressable GCC trade finance market currently stands at approximately USD 130 billion, yet it is constrained by an estimated USD 18 billion in unmet funding. Within this landscape, supply chain finance emerges as the premier growth catalyst, expanding at a 12% clip, while trade credit insurance remains severely underutilised despite its risk-mitigation potential.
These macro-level shifts directly dictate how bespoke financing structures must evolve. As Hasan Juma, CEO of Alteia Capital, highlights:
“The relationship between the GCC and Africa continues to deepen, with businesses increasingly seeking financing structures that support more integrated regional supply chains rather than individual cross-border transactions.”
Asset Manager Munirah BinSaif observes that businesses are actively adjusting “their sourcing strategies, inventory management, and working capital practices to support these changing trade flows. The ability to finance longer payment cycles, support alternative sourcing, and provide flexibility around shipping route changes has become central to how capital supports regional trade.”
Expanding on the infrastructure dimension, Credit Risk Manager Faizan Sabir notes: “Digital platforms are enabling traders to manage longer payment cycles and more complex sourcing strategies. At the same time, access to flexible financing solutions that can accommodate rapid changes in logistics and sourcing has become increasingly important.”
Furthermore, Asset Management Analyst Abdullah Albanayan emphasizes that as regional connectivity strengthens, it heightens the demand for flexible financing structures capable of nurturing broader commercial ecosystems as opposed to merely backing isolated, individual transactions.
Taken together, these systemic developments reinforce a unifying theme across the entire supply chain. As cross-border commercial networks grow increasingly interconnected, effective trade finance must favour continuous adaptation over static frameworks—ensuring that capital flows in lockstep with the evolving realities of global trade.
Following the goods
Supply chains rarely shift due to a single, isolated event. Instead, they transform through thousands of incremental commercial decisions made every day by producers, processors, traders, logistics providers, lenders, and buyers navigating changing regulations, market volatility, and consumer demand.
Tracking physical trade flows through the mechanism of trade finance offers a strategic vantage point that extends far beyond individual transactions. This perspective uncovers how cross-border relationships develop, how working capital requirements fluctuate, where operational pressures first materialise, and how capital dynamically recalibrates alongside shifting trade lanes.
Ultimately, trade finance is not merely about moving capital. It relies on a deep understanding of how cargo moves, how businesses operate, and how supply chains transform. Funding becomes most powerful when it reflects these distinct commercial realities, as opposed to forcing them into rigid, formulaic structures.
As global commerce continues to redefine itself, the institutional capability to analyse these changes from deep within the supply chain will remain just as vital as the liquidity that sustains it.
Data Sources¹
The GCC-Africa trade corridor statistics, payment method transformation data, working capital metrics, and regional finance market analysis presented in this Insight are derived from:
– Alteia’s proprietary GCC Trade Intelligence Study (2026)
– Transaction-level analysis across Alteia’s 44-borrower portfolio (USD 841M deployed since 2023)
– Regional payment behaviour and digital adoption tracking across GCC-Africa trade flows
All figures represent market observations based on Alteia’s portfolio activity and regional market research as of June 2026.
About Alteia
Alteia is a specialist investment manager focused on short-term, self-liquidating trade finance across Africa and the GCC. The group deploys secured and Shariah-compliant credit solutions through fund entities managed by Alteia Fund Management Limited, a Mauritius-licensed and regulated investment management company, and through Alteia Capital, a Saudi CMA-licensed investment firm, under a disciplined governance framework.
Further information
If you would like to continue the conversation or learn more about Alteia’s approach to trade finance, you are welcome to connect with us on LinkedIn or reach out to the team at contact@alteiafund.com or infoksa@alteiafund.com.
Any discussion is informational in nature and subject to applicable regulatory and compliance considerations.
