International Trade – insights from our 2025 Trading Places report

June 2025 marks the ninth anniversary of the UK’s historic referendum, triggering the process of the country’s withdrawal from the EU. While international trade has never been simple, Brexit was the first in a series of seismic shocks that forged an increasingly complex environment for small and medium sized businesses.

"As the fine print of trade negotiations is agreed, foreign exchange risk remains a very real concern for SMEs, as borne out in our latest study."

Michael McGowan, Managing Director, Bibby Foreign Exchange

Our findings

Considering the ever-shifting trading landscape in which they operate, the report finds UK importers and exporters facing stubborn uncertainty. Despite this, many remain confident regarding their own import and/or export volumes over the year ahead. This report identifies three key focus areas for SME owners, private and public sector organisations to boost trade, reduce complexity and protect profit margins.

1. Understand tariffs
   This report highlights current trade frictions as a key concern of UK importers and exporters and one which threatens to impact existing operations and stifle growth plans. With a constantly evolving trade agreement environment, business owners, their advisors and partners more than ever need to keep abreast of global trade agreements, either by utilising Government resources such as the UK Global Tariff (UKGT) website - which details existing rates for different product types - or by seeking expert advice from customs agents or brokers. Furthermore, it’s critical importers and exporters consider customs classification codes carefully, as misclassification can cause delays or fines.


2. Mitigate foreign exchange risk
   Increased volatility brings foreign exchange risk, and in such a fast-moving world, it’s vital SMEs have considered FX strategies to prevent profit margin erosion. Positively, this report reflects a proactive SME community, many of whom have already adjusted their strategies. Using a specialist FX provider can both reduce transactional cost and allow businesses to focus on driving growth by using forward contracts to buy or sell currency at a fixed rate - locking in both costs and revenue. Additionally, specialist providers can help SMEs to assess the benefits of invoicing in different currencies, while regularly monitoring FX markets and trends. This is something that we at Bibby Foreign Exchange can help with. If you need to make international payments, our foreign exchange services can lock in a rate for a future date as well as supporting with immediate trading needs.


3. Diversify supply chain geographies
   While our report encouragingly shows UK SMEs employing diverse supply chains, with the current fluid situation in mind, this must remain a key focus. Diversifying suppliers reduces the risk of geopolitical tensions, port congestion, or trade disputes, and onshoring, nearshoring or “friendshoring” options may alleviate tariff exposure and transit times. Support and advice are available, and SMEs can use market intelligence tools and government resources (such as the UK’s Department for International Trade) to identify emerging or underserved markets. It’s important SMEs consider essential factors such as market size, growth potential, regulatory environment, cultural fit, and ease of doing business.

Our findings also highlighted the impact of payment delays and extended payment terms with overseas customers. If this is something that impacts your business, you could consider Export Invoice Finance. This is a funding solution that releases the value of outstanding invoices and helps businesses overcome the complexities of selling goods or services overseas. It helps businesses to overcome these challenges, providing certainty of payment, upfront payment against overseas invoices and access to our export specialists.

You can download the report by clicking on this link for further details of our findings.

Related content: 2025 SME confidence tracker