There are a number of  Trading and Acronyms that are commonly used:

Letter of Intent - LOI   This is a confirms the intention to purchase and specifies the product, and any contract conditions which may apply. If an LOI includes full banking details, then a BCL may not be needed.

Bank Comfort/Conformity Letter - BCL. This is a letter supplied by a bank confirming that funds are available for the transaction.

Irrevocable Commission Payment Order - ICPO. This is a fee protection agreement usually required where a broker is involved in the transaction.

Full Corporate Offer - FCO. This is the formal offer submitted for the contract. 

These are the procedures which are generally followed:

1. The BUYER sends completed LOI and BCL or banking approval for a soft probe on the buyers account via fax or e-mail. This will be on Company headed notepaper.

2. The SELLER sends FCO  to buyer based on the LOI and BCL or bank information sent by BUYER.  BUYER then signs and returns FCO.

3. The SELLER sends DRAFT CONTRACT by e-mail or fax to be reviewed and signed by SELLER.

After these initial steps, then the Hard Copies of the contract and exchanged while the PROOF of PRODUCT and PROOF of FUNDS are verified through each sides respective banks.

Proof of Product and Proof of Funds are done through the banks to be absolutely verifiable, legal, and certain.

OTHER COMMONLY USED TERMS:

AFC - Advance Fixing Certificate. A licence which allows you to trade goods at a fixed rate. This means you will know in advance how much you will get as a refund or pay as a levy.

ACR - Agricultural Conversion Rate. The ACT is used to convert from ECUs into EC national currencies.

CA - Compensation Agreement

CN Code - Commodity Nomenclature code.

C&F - Carriage and Freight

ECU - European Currency Unit, now known as the Euro

EMS - European Monetary System

E.U. - European Union

FPA - Fee Protection Agreement

FOB - Free on Board

GATT - General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs

ICUMSA - International Commission for Uniform Methods of Sugar Analysis

An ICUMSA rating is an international unit for expressing the purity of the sugar in solution, and is directly related to the colour of the sugar. There are different types of ICUMSA units. For Brazilian sugar, the lower the ICUMSA the whiter the sugar. The EU has the opposite rating standard as shown below. 

In Brazil ICUMSA rating of 45 rbu for refined, indicates the highest quality. A rating of ICUMSA 150 would be for grades of lower quality such as Special Extra Crystal. 

IUMSA 46 for the highest EU grade and ICUMSA 42 for E.U. raw.

RBU (rbu) - Reference Base Units

MT - Metric Tonne 

NCNDA - Non Circumvent Non Disclosure Agreement

PBG - Prime Bank Guarantee

US$ - United States Dollars

WTO - World Trade Organisation