Barclays has made three senior hires within its trade and working capital division, including the appointment of Michaël Hache as director and country head for France and Benelux.

Hache (pictured), who has also been named as a director, joins alongside Dermot Flanagan and Fortunato Cristiano, who have both been appointed senior vice-presidents and senior trade and working capital originators in Ireland and Italy respectively.

With over 15 years of experience in banking and insurance, Hache joins from Aon France, where he was in charge of business development for its credit solutions between 2018 and 2020.

Hache was previously a relationship manager for trade and structured finance at Deutsche Bank, and prior to that, spent seven years at BNP Paribas, most recently as vice-president for structured export finance.

In his new role, Hache is expected to manage and grow Barclays Europe’s portfolio of France and Benelux-based clients, delivering “sophisticated solutions to help them to win new international business, mitigate risks, protect their receivables, finance their contracts and optimise their working capital”, a bank spokesperson says.

Flanagan and Cristiano, meanwhile, will work to establish and manage a portfolio of new target customers, while identifying trade and working capital opportunities for existing clients.

Dublin-based Flanagan previously spent more than six years at HSBC, most recently in Australia as senior business development manager for commodities. Prior to that he held business development and portfolio management roles at Sargon and ANZ.

Cristiano is based in Milan, and has been at Barclays for over 13 years. His most recent position was as global relationship manager for the bank’s corporate division, also based in Italy.

The bank spokesperson says Flanagan and Cristiano are expected to work closely with corporate relationship directors “to deliver financial solutions, however complex, that are right for our clients’ businesses”.

The appointments come as Barclays Corporate Banking announces it is working with CGI, a global technology and business consultancy, to implement an end-to-end trade finance platform for Barclays clients around the world.

The platform, called CGI Trade360, aims to give clients greater connectivity and visibility across their supply chains in order to optimise capital efficiency, funding and risk mitigation.

“We have a longstanding partnership with CGI, and the CGI Trade360 platform will mean we can continue delivering the best possible trade solutions and service to our clients for many years to come,” says James Binns, global head of trade and working capital at Barclays.