Cross-border B2B payments for importers and exporters

Why international business payments are hard for traders

A trading company sits between two payment problems. It has to pay suppliers abroad, often before the goods ship, and it has to collect from buyers abroad, often after they arrive. Each side runs on a different bank, currency and timetable.

Correspondent chains

An international wire rarely goes straight from one bank to another. It passes through one or more correspondent banks, and each can hold the payment for checks or route it the long way round. Nobody in the trade controls that chain, so a wire that left on time can still arrive late.

Deductions in transit

Intermediary banks can take their own charge from the amount in transit. A supplier who invoiced a round figure receives less, the invoice shows as part-paid, and someone has to send a top-up. The fix is contractual as much as technical: agree in advance who bears intermediary charges.

Banking hours, holidays and time zones

Every rail has cut-off times and banking days. When the buyer, the supplier and the correspondent banks sit in different time zones, a payment instructed late in one place lands on the next business day in another, and a public holiday on any leg of the route adds a day.

Counterparties who hold stablecoins

Some buyers and suppliers operate in markets where sending or receiving dollar wires is slow, limited or unreliable. Many of them already hold USDT or USDC, and would rather pay, or be paid, that way. Turning those stablecoins into fiat you can use is the part most banks can't help with.

Currency mismatch

You invoice in dollars, the buyer pays in USDT, your supplier wants euros and your costs are in pounds or dirhams. Each step between currencies is a conversion, and an unagreed rate on any of them eats into the margin on the deal.

How settlement works for trade flows

Sentvia runs both sides of a trade through accounts in your company's own name, held side by side in USD, EUR, GBP and AED.

Receiving from buyers

1. Request a quote. Tell us the amount the buyer will send in USDT or USDC.
2. Lock the rate. Approve the quote; that is the rate the conversion settles at.
3. The buyer sends the stablecoins to the address we give you for that conversion. We screen the payment on arrival.
4. Receive fiat into your company's named IBAN account, in the currency you chose.

Buyers who pay by bank transfer pay into the same named accounts, so the receivables ledger has one home whichever way the buyer pays. Your bank and your buyers see your company as the account holder.

Paying suppliers

1. Add the supplier as a beneficiary. Our compliance team reviews each new beneficiary once, with supporting documents.
2. Instruct the payment from the account in the supplier's currency, converting first if you need to.
3. Approve and release. Your own approval rules apply before any funds leave.
4. The supplier is paid in fiat over the rail for that currency.

Where a supplier asks to be paid in stablecoins, Sentvia can convert fiat to stablecoins and send them. Raise it during onboarding so we understand the flow from the start. Read more about first- and third-party payments.

Processing times depend on currency, jurisdiction and bank rails used.

Compliance expectations for trade

Regulated providers look at trade payments through the trade itself. A payment that matches a real shipment, between parties who are who they say they are, is straightforward. Expect four things.

• Documents that match the payment. Invoices, contracts and purchase orders should name the same parties, amounts and currencies as the payment. Keep shipping documents to hand.
• Beneficiary review, once. Each supplier is reviewed by our compliance team with supporting documents before the first payment. After that, paying them is routine.
• Screening on every payment. Incoming stablecoins are screened on the blockchain before conversion, for risks such as sanctioned addresses and illicit services, and every payment is screened against sanctions lists. Monitoring runs in real time on every transaction.
• Source of funds for larger payments. We may ask how a buyer came to hold the stablecoins they are sending. Our guide to source of funds for stablecoin payments lists the evidence that answers it.

A request for information is routine, not an accusation. If your business has its own anti-money laundering or export control obligations, they stay with you; our checks sit alongside them. Our compliance and regulation page sets out our registrations.

Currencies and corridors for trade

The corridors traders use most:

• USDT to USD for dollar-invoiced trade, paid by wire
• USDT to EUR and USDC to EUR for European suppliers and buyers, over SEPA
• USDT to GBP for UK counterparties, over Faster Payments
• USDT to AED for UAE trading companies

Which products fit

• Multi-currency accounts. Hold USD, EUR, GBP and AED side by side, so you can pay a supplier in the currency you were paid in without converting twice.
• Named IBAN accounts. Accounts in your company's own legal name, provided through regulated banking partners.
• Payments. First-party transfers between your own accounts and third-party payments to approved suppliers, with approval controls before release.
• Prime OTC desk. For a large single settlement, such as a full cargo paid in one transfer, quoted and locked per trade.

Payments, conversions and transaction history sit in one dashboard, on the web or in the Sentvia Pay app. For other sectors we serve, see industries.

Before your first trade payment

• Agree with each counterparty which currency the invoice is in and how it will be paid.
• Agree who bears intermediary bank charges on wires.
• Send us supplier documents early, so beneficiary review is done before a payment is due.
• Lock the rate before a buyer sends stablecoins, and check the quote shows the fiat amount you expect.
• Allow for cut-offs and public holidays on every leg of the route when a payment has a deadline.

This page explains how Sentvia processes payments. It is not investment advice.