French-based Coface Group, arguably the world's largest credit risk insurer, has decided to operate alone in Australia.Coface had been operating as an authorised representative of Dexta Corporation since May 2004 as Coface Services (Australia) Pty Ltd, when it acquired and began operating the trade credit business from Dexta.The insurer - a specialist in domestic and export credit insurance - underwrites US$300 billion annually of worldwide trade. In Australia, Coface is offering the market credit and political risk analysis and assessment, customer monitoring, collections management and receivables financing.Jerome Cazes, chief executive of Coface Group, said last week that fewer than five per cent of registered companies in Australia were exporters, a figure he said was very low.Coface has been underwriting trade into Australia for the past 60 years."We have identified a very low take up of credit insurance in Australia which is putting exporters at risk," Cazes said. "We are launching our operation here with an intention to address this risk."James Melrose, Coface Australia's general manager, said he was excited about the prospects for the Australian operation and potential for growth."We currently have a 10 per cent share of the Australian market and we expect to grow the portfolio and increase our market share with a concentrated effort through our new direct sales initiatives and our broker market," he said."We expect to make inroads through our global international clients and directly into export commodity markets where we have previously not had a presence."Melrose was formerly Dexta's manager of trade credit business and held that role with Coface Services (Australia) when the business transferred in 2004.Other providers of export credit insurance include Atradius (which bought the short-term export insurance business from EFIC two years ago), QBE and Export Finance Insurance Corp, which concentrates mostly on high value contracts and supplies political risk insurance.Republished from Insurance News Australia. Originally published by INA 17 February 2006.