Counterparty KYC API for Trade Finance

The problem this solves

In trade finance, the riskiest moment is onboarding a counterparty you have never transacted with. A relationship manager receives an inquiry from a buyer or seller, often introduced through a broker, and has to decide whether the party is real, licensed to do what they claim, and not subject to sanctions. Doing this by hand means juggling sanctions lists, company registries, licence databases, and reference calls across multiple jurisdictions. The work is slow, inconsistent between analysts, and hard to evidence later when a compliance review or audit asks how a decision was made.

OilFlow's Counterparty KYC-as-API packages that screening work into a single programmatic call. You submit a counterparty, and the API runs a defined sequence of checks and returns a structured result you can store, review, and act on.

What the capability does

The API runs a 7-step screen on a counterparty:

1. Sanctions and PEP screening. Checks against eight lists: OFAC SDN, OFAC Consolidated, UN, EU, UK HMT, Canada SEMA, Australia DFAT, and Swiss SECO. It also screens for politically exposed persons (PEP).
2. Company registration. Verifies registration data via OpenCorporates and national registries.
3. Regulatory licence checks. Looks at licensing across 235 jurisdictions.
4. Asset confirmation. Confirms claimed assets.
5. Trade references. Checks trade references.
6. Digital-footprint scoring. Scores the counterparty's online presence.
7. Broker-scam pattern detection. Flags patterns associated with broker scams.

A sanctions match is a hard stop. The API returns a structured dossier containing the results of the screen so you can review the findings and the basis for them.

Pricing is pay-as-you-go starting at $25 per screen. A free read-only sandbox key is available with no card required, so a developer can evaluate the response format before committing.

How a team would use it

A developer integrates the API into the point in your workflow where a new counterparty enters the pipeline. That might be a CRM onboarding form, a deal-intake system, or a manual screening console used by your compliance desk.

A typical flow:

• Start with the sandbox key to inspect the structure of the returned dossier and map its fields into your own records or case-management system. The sandbox is read-only, so use it for integration work, not for live screening decisions.
• When ready, switch to a live key and submit a counterparty when a deal or relationship is first proposed.
• Store the returned dossier alongside your deal record so the screening result is attached to the file and available for later review.
• Treat a sanctions match as a hard stop in your own process, consistent with the API's behavior. The other six steps return findings that your analysts and compliance officers weigh as part of a decision.
• Re-screen counterparties at the intervals your own policy requires, since a single screen reflects the data available at the time it was run.

Because the output is structured, the dossier is well suited to being logged as audit evidence of the checks performed at onboarding.

Honest scope: what it does not do

Be clear about the boundaries so you can fit the API correctly into your controls:

• It runs the seven steps described above and returns a dossier. It does not make your onboarding or credit decision for you. Apart from the sanctions hard stop, the findings are inputs for your team to assess.
• It is not a substitute for your own KYC, AML, or sanctions program, your customer due diligence policy, or any regulatory obligation you carry directly.
• This explainer states no accuracy rates, false-positive rates, processing volumes, or customer counts, because those figures are not part of the capability described here. Do not assume any.
• No certification status (such as SOC 2 or ISO) is claimed here. Confirm any security or compliance attestation directly before production use.
• Screening reflects the underlying data sources and lists at the time of the screen. Coverage depends on those sources, and findings can change as data changes.

Relevant public regulatory frameworks

The API supports work that intersects with several public frameworks. It does not certify your compliance with any of them.

• FATF Recommendation 10 (Customer Due Diligence). FATF sets out the international standard for identifying and verifying a customer, understanding the nature of the relationship, and conducting ongoing due diligence. The company registration, licence, asset, reference, and PEP elements of the screen produce information relevant to a CDD process. You remain responsible for applying the risk-based approach FATF requires.
• OFAC sanctions programs. The US Office of Foreign Assets Control administers the SDN and Consolidated lists. Screening against these lists is part of complying with US sanctions prohibitions. The other six lists in the screen reflect equivalent regimes from the UN, EU, UK, Canada, Australia, and Switzerland.
• UCP 600. The ICC Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits governs documentary credit practice in trade finance. It is a documentary framework and sits alongside, rather than within, counterparty screening. Knowing your counterparty is a separate discipline from examining documents under a letter of credit.

Getting started

Request the free read-only sandbox key, review the dossier structure against your own data model, and decide where in your onboarding flow a screen belongs. When you move to live screening, keep the sanctions hard stop in your process and treat the remaining findings as evidence your team reviews, not as a final decision the API makes for you.