US: Barbour Stock well Inc. has depend on the US Export-Import Bank to offering insurance in casing one of its foreign customers doesn’t pay its bills; the product has overcast the Woburn Company’s risk and helped it break into new international markets Exports account for as much as half the sales of the company, which makes test equipment for manufacturers of high-speed machinery and has about 20 employees
Ken Millar, president of Barbour Stock well, said the low-cost insurance also allows the company to compete with foreign firms that receive similar assistance from their governments “It would be difficult and expensive to find another source’’ of insurance, he said, “We’d be at a disadvantage.”But Millar might soon find his company at such a disadvantage. The Export-Import Bank, a federal agency that provides insurance, credit, and other financial services to exporters, will go out of business at the end of the month unless Congress reauthorizes it. The future of the bank is the next big trade issue facing Congress, following an overwhelming vote by the House on Friday to deny the authority that President Osama sought to complete negotiations on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal
