The SBI SCO 2026 Syllabus for Trade Finance Officer has two stages: an online written test and a personal interview. SBI has not put out a separate 2026 syllabus, but the pattern has stayed consistent across 2023 and 2024. The subject-wise breakdown below is based on those previous years. Last updated: 17.05.2026.
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SBI SCO 2026 Exam Pattern Overview
| Phase | Type | Marks | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phase I | Online Written Test (Objective) | 200 | 120 minutes |
| Phase II | Personal Interview | 50 | — |
Final merit uses combined Phase I and Phase II marks. Clearing Phase I alone does not get you selected.
Phase I Written Test Pattern
| Subject | Questions | Marks |
|---|---|---|
| Reasoning Ability | 50 | 50 |
| English Language | 50 | 50 |
| General Awareness (Banking Focus) | 50 | 50 |
| Professional Knowledge (Trade Finance) | 50 | 50 |
| Total | 200 | 200 |
Negative marking: 0.25 marks per wrong answer. No penalty for skipped questions.
Professional Knowledge Syllabus (Most Important Section)
This section has 50 marks and is where Trade Finance Officer candidates either pull ahead or fall behind. If you already work in forex or trade finance, the topics will feel familiar. The key is revising the rules and instruments before the exam, not just relying on work experience.
Trade Finance Instruments
- Letter of Credit (LC) — types, parties, mechanism, discrepancies
- Bank Guarantee (BG) and Standby Letter of Credit (SBLC)
- Documentary Collections — DP, DA, clean collections
- Bills under LC and bills under collection
- Pre-shipment and post-shipment finance — packing credit, PCFC, PSFC
- Buyers credit and suppliers credit
- Factoring and forfaiting in international trade
International Rules and Regulations
- UCP 600 — Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits
- ISBP 821 — International Standard Banking Practice
- URC 522 — Uniform Rules for Collections
- URDG 758 — Uniform Rules for Demand Guarantees
- Incoterms 2020 — EXW, FOB, CIF, DDP and all other trade terms
- FEMA 1999 and RBI Master Directions on Export-Import
Foreign Exchange Arithmetic
- Spot rate, forward rate, cross rate calculations
- Exchange margin and loading concepts
- TT rates, bill rates, buying and selling rates
- Nostro, Vostro, and Loro accounts
- SWIFT messaging — MT 700, MT 710, MT 760, MT 103
Compliance and Risk
- Trade-Based Money Laundering (TBML) — red flag indicators
- OFAC and UN sanctions compliance
- KYC and AML requirements in trade finance
- ECGC covers — standard policies, specific policies
- EXIM Bank products and schemes
General Awareness Syllabus
- RBI policies — repo rate, reverse repo, CRR, SLR, MSF
- Banking sector news and developments (last 6 months)
- Government financial schemes — PMJDY, Mudra, Stand-Up India, PM SVANidhi
- International financial institutions — BIS, IMF, World Bank, ADB, NDB
- India trade statistics and major trading partners
- Current affairs — economy, budget highlights, Union Budget 2026
- Awards and appointments in banking and finance
Reasoning Ability Syllabus
- Seating arrangement — circular, linear, floor-based
- Puzzles and syllogisms
- Coding-decoding, blood relations, direction sense
- Data sufficiency and logical reasoning
- Inequalities and order-ranking
English Language Syllabus
- Reading comprehension — banking and finance passages
- Para jumbles and sentence completion
- Error detection and phrase replacement
- Cloze test and fill in the blanks
- Vocabulary — synonyms, antonyms in context
Phase II Personal Interview
The interview is 50 marks. You need 25 to qualify if you are in General, EWS, or OBC. SC, ST, and PwBD candidates need 22.5. Questions focus on your actual work experience and how well you know UCP 600. Case-based questions come up regularly. A common one: a discrepancy has been raised on an LC presentation — walk through how you would handle it.
Preparation Strategy
- Professional Knowledge first — put 60% of your time here. Go through UCP 600 article by article and practice spotting discrepancies in LC documents
- General Awareness — track RBI announcements and banking news daily for the three weeks before the exam, with a focus on trade-related developments
- Reasoning and English — standard bank exam level. If you have appeared for bank exams before, a month of daily practice is enough
- Interview — structure your work experience as a clear narrative. Know your current employer trade finance processes well enough to explain them without notes
Also see: SBI SCO 2026 Apply Online | SBI SCO 2026 Admit Card
Free Mock Tests — SBI
Practice with exam-pattern based mock tests. Instant results, section-wise analysis.
- SBI Clerk 2026 Prelims Full Mock (100 Qs | 60 min | Negative marking)
- SBI SCO 2026 Trade Finance Officer Mock Test 1 (120 Qs | 90 min | Negative marking)
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