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Insights Newsletter

Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 29, 2019

Fishing for Clarity: Murky Bank Fees and Whether to Pay to Reduce Them

Why paying for performance when trying to cut bank fees may not hold water. The pain point of bank fees is not significant enough to justify paying vendors who promise to analyze and reduce them on a performance basis. This was the consensus of NeuGroup members discussing bank fee management—one of their top priorities—at a recent meeting.  While in theory it might make sense to pay a contingency fee based on how much a vendor saves a company, treasury operations…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 24, 2019

Rating and Ranking External Investment Managers

Key elements for designing a scorecard to evaluate external manager performance. Members at a recent meeting of cash investment managers discussed effective external manager evaluations, including what belongs in scorecards.  Big picture. The presenting member runs the credit portion of her company’s portfolio and considers various criteria to score managers. She is increasingly using more qualitative metrics in addition to portfolio returns. Her team’s key elements to evaluate managers are: Investment performance Market and credit insight Risk management and compliance Client service and reportingTeam stability; diversity and…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 24, 2019

Safety First: Investment Managers Reduce Risk, Shorten Duration

Cash investment managers are shying away from risk and heading toward safety and liquidity.    The vast majority of members at recent NeuGroup meeting of cash investment managers expressed very little desire to increase the risk or duration of their portfolios to boost yield. Indeed, their priorities—in order—may be best expressed as SLY: safety, liquidity, yield.  The inverted curve. One key factor in this low-risk stance was the inverted or flat shape of the yield curve at the time of the meeting.…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 24, 2019

The Art of Rising in Finance: A CFO’s Advice on Job Selection

One woman’s criteria for choosing new jobs that lead to higher rungs on the professional ladder. At the latest Women in NeuGroup* event, held at Expedia in Seattle, Jenny Ceran, CFO of Smartsheet, suggested that women moving up the ladder should take chances—and take a job even if it means most of it would be learning.  Her path to CFO. After working in finance at Sara Lee and Cisco, Ms. Ceran won the treasurer’s job at eBay at age 39 ¾., achieving her…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 17, 2019

The Heavy Lift of Automating Cash Flow Forecasting

Consider the time and money needed to put AI to use in cash forecasts. The pain of accurate cash flow forecasting is all too familiar to treasurers used to struggling with multiple models, getting access to data and convincing business units of the importance of timely and accurate forecast submissions. No wonder many treasurers are eager to learn more about using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to make the job easier. Good news, bad news. The treasurer of a large…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 17, 2019

Diving Into UniCredit’s Russia Pooling Solution

The benefits of using nonresident and resident accounts in a cash pool.  Ears perked up at a NeuGroup meeting of treasurers sponsored by UniCredit when the bank described an international cash pooling product to improve an MNC’s liquidity management in Russia while ensuring compliance with the local legal and regulatory constraints. Here are highlights: UniCredit owns the largest foreign-owned bank in Russia and the solution gives clients the ability to manage RUB liquidity via a nonresident account as part of…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 15, 2019

People Risk and the Cyberfraud Balancing Act

Treasurers walk a fine line as they try to reduce the risk of cybercrime by taking humans—often the last line of defense—out of vulnerable processes like payments. Mitigating cyberfraud in the treasury and payments area (including AP) is tricky when it comes to people risk.  On the one hand, people are the weakest link because they can be convinced by cyberfraudsters deploying social engineering to violate procedure to send out payments they shouldn’t. Or, being human and fallible, they click…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 15, 2019

Digital and People Savvy Applicants Desired

What skills should corporate finance functions look for? AI understanding, yes, but a human touch, too. Today and certainly in the not-too-distant future, success will come to finance leaders who find the right balance between digital savvy and human self-awareness to solve problems and perform at a high level; and do this with a diverse set of people across the enterprise.  Digital savvy and will to learn. HR finance leads who joined our treasury peer group members at a recent meeting…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 10, 2019

What’s Keeping Bank Treasurers Busy This Fall

Banks should get ready for “a relatively active fall” when it comes to capital and liquidity, as well as Basel rules, one expert said. Ben Weiner, a partner at law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, told members of NeuGroup’s bank treasurers group to be ready for lots of activity when it comes to managing capital and liquidity. New rules like accounting for current expected credit losses (CECL) have dominated the conversation but there are other areas that need to be considered: Trading book…
Christina Popik
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Insights NewsletterUncategorized
October 10, 2019

Treasurers Grapple with the Prospect of Negative Interest Rates in the US

The only thing that’s certain about interest rates is uncertainty and divided opinions. In Europe. Treasurers at a NeuGroup meeting sponsored by Unicredit last week heard a senior bank executive say he expects to see negative interest rates in Europe for the next two to three years. More than $17 trillion in debt now carries negative yields. This week, Unicredit’s CEO told a French TV channel that the bank is working on measures to transfer the European Central Bank’s negative rates “onto big companies…
Christina Popik
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