Diana Bustamante has joined ABN Amro in New York as a director and regional head for trade credit distribution North America. She reports to Hanspeter Rellstab, global head of trade credit distribution, in
London. Bustamante will be responsible for the sell down of all trade finance-related transactions into the US and Canadian markets (except structured commodity finance deals).
She will also look at opportunities (on the buy side) that might fit the bank’s portfolio – in the wider context of an asset trading mandate.

Furthermore, Darius Mistry has joined the bank to head up the team in London. He was previously at BNP Paribas Geneva, where he was a director in the commodity structured finance group covering corporate clients in Russia and former CIS countries. Mistry is a director and the regional head of trade credit distribution for Europe/Africa based in London (reporting to Rellstab). His responsibilities are similar to Bustamante’s but additionally he’ll be looking to further develop the group’s distribution capabilities on the corporate side. He is also deputy head of the department.

Meanwhile, ABN is building a dedicated trade credit distribution desk in Dubai headed by Viresh Mathur that will cover the Gulf region, including the Islamic investor base. Mathur is an internal transferee.

In terms of trade credit distribution, the bank is focusing on its hubs in New York, London, Dubai, Singapore and Sao Paulo. “While trade credit distribution has sold around US$2.8bn in the market in 2004, we’ve purchased about US$450mn from the (secondary) market,” claims Rellstab.