In a blow to the Island's efforts to become a centre for electronic commerce, Bermuda-based Full Service Trade System looks set to pull up stakes and relocate to the US.

Full Service was set up in Bermuda about three years ago to develop TradeCard, an electronic method of international trade finance. The system, which went into operation last year, is now available in 29 countries and has the potential to become the means of conducting billions of dollars worth of business to business trade. Now the company has filed notice to amalgamate with a Delaware company, and continue operations in the US.

When contacted yesterday Full Service chief financial officer Anthony Nagel said the company would be issuing a Press release next week on the matter.

"The company is negotiating with a US venture capital provider,'' he said.

"A contract has been submitted to shareholders and a vote will be held on February 3.'' Full Service employs ten staff at the company's Par-La-Ville Road offices, six of whom are Bermudian. The company was set up with the backing of the World Trade Centres Association (WTCA), an international non-profit association which promotes cross-border trade and is based at the World Trade Centre in New York. WTCA was founded in 1970 and has a membership base of 500,000 companies worldwide.

Full Service has about 30 shareholders, including NationsBank Corp., the third largest bank in the US, and Standard Chartered Bank in London.

The company was set up with projections that it could reach a volume of up to 1.5 million trades a year in five years time, a small but significant chunk of the $3 trillion worth of international trade a year currently being done by letter of credit.

TradeCard is patented software that allows companies to buy and sell directly from their destop computer over a secure electronic network provided by GE Information Services. The system is meant as an electronic alternative to the paper-based letter of credit process which requires bank staff to examine documents manually before releasing payment for a trade.

"TradeCard will become the standard way to trade by the year 2000,'' Full Service Trade System chairman and WTCA president Guy Tozzoli claimed in an interview last year with The Royal Gazette .