Speaker Profile

Buddy Baker
Manager, Global Trade Solutions Delivery, Fifth Third Bank

Walter (Buddy) Baker brings more than 30 years of experience in international trade finance to his current position as Vice President and head of Global Trade Solutions Delivery for Fifth Third Bank. Fifth Third is one of the 20 largest banks in the US and provides a full range of risk mitigation and financing products for exporters and importers. Mr. Baker's professional experience includes earlier stints with Atradius Trade Credit Insurance, ABN AMRO Bank, Bank of America, Wachovia Bank, and The First National Bank of Chicago.

Mr. Baker is a recognized expert in trade finance and author of numerous magazine articles and the books Users’ Handbook to Documentary Credits under UCP600, Documentary Payments & Short-Term Trade Finance, and The Regulatory Environment of Letters of Credit and Trade Finance. He owns the consulting firm Global Trade Risk Management Strategies, which specializes in educational training, and makes frequent presentations for national associations of exporters, importers, bankers, and lawyers. As a member of the National Letter of Credit Committee of the International Financial Services Association, the Advisory Council of the Institute for International Banking Law and Practice, and the Council for International Standby Practices, Mr. Baker is actively involved in establishing national and worldwide standard practices for LCs.

He participated in the most recent revision of the Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits (referred to as "UCP600"), contributed to the creation of the official ICC guide for examining letter of credit documents, called the International Standard Banking Practices for the Examination of Documents under Documentary Credits, and served on the drafting committees for the International Standby Practices ("ISP98") and Article 5 of the Uniform Commercial Code.

He is also on the Board of Directors of the Association of International Credit and Trade Finance Professionals ("ICTF"), a multinational association of export credit managers.