TOMATO CATCH-UP - Newsletter Issue 193 – June 2016
Your monthly resource on working capital, process optimization and issues relating to the world of corporate treasurers, IT professionals and bankers!
This newsletter is multi-lingual, English, German and French depending on the source.
Various aspects of blockchain, cyber security and crowdfunding are again often addressed issues in the finance and IT press. Also, changes in cash pooling, a new SWIFT message format and a new leasing standard are introduced. As summer approaches, be aware of upcoming changes, but they’ll appear again, so don’t crowd your head with them. Know what’s ahead and then enjoy the slower pace and change of scenery during summer break! Schöni Ferie!
We will take a break as well and will be back with another newsletter in early September.
For any issue you’re facing that you’d like to discuss with someone outside your company, someone who has experience from working with clients from various sectors, feel free to contact martin.schneider@tomato.ch or call 044 814 2001.
Enjoy the variety!
Regula Spottl
Topics
- Videocast: Industrial Processes vs Treasury and Financial Processes
- The Treasurer’s Dual Role: Operational and Strategic
- SEPA revisited - Mission accomplished?
- Corporate Treasurers Want TMS to be Simple and Efficient
- Changes in Cash Pooling
- New SWIFT MT 202 COV Message Format
- New Leasing Standard IFRS 16
- Blockchain and Banks’ Evolving Landscape
- Cyber Security – Valuable Resources
- Crowdfunding in der Schweiz zeigt hohes Wachstum / Tips for Investors
Videocast: Industrial Processes vs Treasury and Financial Processes
In his latest videocast, Martin Schneider explains what distinguishes industrial processes from financial processes or financial flow. Companies typically take great pride in their industrial processes, meticulously setting a standard, monitoring it, measuring it, and ensuring the best possible quality at a cost that makes competitive pricing possible.
For company leaders, financial processes are often less in the spotlight but they are equally important. Optimizing financial flows involves best practice tools and channels, relationships with banks, monitoring and continued improvements in order to achieve the best possible solutions in all its activities.
Financial processes are our strength. Together, we can develop processes that fulfil your needs and ensure a competitive advantage. Videocast (3:21 mins) To read Flipchart text, best watched in full screen mode!
The Treasurer’s Dual Role: Operational and Strategic
Each time I come across an article outlining the treasurer’s role, I revert to our webpage The Role of Today's Corporate Treasurer. It offers a good overview of the treasurer’s role in terms of maximizing peak operating efficiency and decision-making criteria.
The GTNews article A practical guide to strategic treasury offers an additional dimension as it focuses on treasury’s strategic business function, the impact treasury has on other business areas and its contribution to issues at management level.
The article describes six tasks which require the treasurer to play a dual role and offers a graph that specifies the strategic and operational responsibilities for each of the six tasks.
The article helps teams to gain an overview of what they are involved in and to get clarity over how their jobs fit into the whole finance function. In turn, it will make their job more meaningful!
SEPA revisited - Mission accomplished?
In one workshop at the EBAday 2016 Congress in Milan, experts discussed SEPA. Presentations included objectives, economic analyses and benefits. Panelists further talked about whether the mission was accomplished, benefits beyond SEPA and how to do it better next time. Details…
The list of benefits in general and “other key benefits” offers you a chance to review if there are opportunities you have not exploited and may want to discuss with Martin Schneider. Feel free to call at 044 814 2001.
We’ve posted the list of features and benefits in a blog.
Corporate Treasurers Want TMS to be Simple and Efficient
One of corporate treasurer’s biggest hurdle is that they constantly have to find ways to do more with less. To deal with their monumental tasks, they need to partner with banks and external experts, suggest Sonya Crites, D+H’s head of product management for cash management solutions.
Treasurers expect their bank to offer dynamic TMSs that deliver efficiency, evolve with the client’s needs and are simple and easy to use.
In her GTNews article Providing TMS to corporate treasurers: why simplicity is key, Crites elaborates on three key areas where banks can meet these expectations: architecture, functionality, and operational capabilities. Full story…
Martin’s comment:
The Swiss branch of D+H is the known Swift Service Bureau BBP. BBP serves corporates as liaison office or gateway between TMS and the corporate’s partner banks. Ideally, you as corporate treasurer will use your TMS in conjunction with D+H as your internal e-banking solution. This helps you to keep track of your bank signatures internally and will replace your local e-bankings. If you wish to see a practical example how a Swift Service Bureau will be included in a payment project see slide number 4 in the presentation Workflow Tuning with a De-Centralized Payment Factory
Changes in Cash Pooling – The Future of Notional Pooling
Basel III is expected to come into effect in 2019. It will have huge consequences on the notional cash pooling business as it is going to make it harder for banks to offer the service cost-effectively. Some banks will reprice their service while others will stop offering it.
Regardless of the regulation, notional cash pooling will still be attractive for clients with sprawling businesses where the treasurer wants a holistic view of group finances, says Arnaud Pichon, international desk supervisor at Societe Generale. “Corporates must prepare for disruption, but they should not be disheartened if their initial discussions with banks do not go the way they hope”.
Details in Société Générale’s special report Prepare for Changes in Cash Pooling
Related articles:
GtNews.com: Notional pooling: an endangered species?
Der Treasurer: Notional Pooling vor dem Aus (in Deutsch)
New SWIFT MT 202 COV Message Format
Currently, SWIFT message formats use two different message streams: The MT 103 and MST 202.
A new message type, SWIFT MT 202 COV, is designed to solve increasing concerns about transparency of the global payments system.
SWIFT MT 202 COV will be introduced on November 21, 2016. It will contain mandatory information fields for both the originator and beneficiary of a payment.
Details in GTNews article SWIFT Message MT202 COV: Background and Impact Points for Banks
Martin Schneider’s comment:
Another Swift type that plays a more and more important role is Swift Message Type 798, especially if you use Letters of Credits, Guaranties or also called Avale in Germany and if you have already implemented all group payments successfully and are also Score member. Also if you as corporate use Score Swift for Corporate’s License, you also may include MT798 to automate your processes around L/Cs and reduce the existing running costs for your Gateway to your banks.
If your company is involved in leasing and needs to report in IFRS, review the KPMG blog on IFRS 16 Leases. It explains how Swiss financial institutions could be impacted by the new standard.
While the standard gives considerable transition reliefs for lessees, preparers need to find their way through the different options. The transition date January 1, 2019. Details…
Blockchain and Banks’ Evolving Landscape
In a video interview titled Blockchain needs a native digital asset,Ferdinando Ametrano, Head of Blockchain and Virtual Currencies Intesa Sanpaolo, discusses the relationship between bitcoin and blockchain and outlines how banks can stay ahead of this evolving landscape.
Video on finextra.com (7.35 mins)
Cyber Security – Valuable Resources
Fintech, digital developments and cloud computing are increasing the risk of cyber attacks. Financial institutions are especially at risk due to possible direct financial gains for attackers.
Cyber crime encompasses a wide range of sophisticated threats, each presenting specific risks to a company. In the GTNews article Cyber security – Keeping two steps ahead, Neil Katkov of SWIFT summarizes a list of specific risks to an institution.
Katkov also points to the US Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council’s (FFIEC) Information Security Booklet which aims to provide a principles-based guide to cyber security for financial institutions.
Deutsch: “Angst führt zu kurzfristigem Denken”
KPMGs Markus Brändle argumentiert in einem Interview, dass bei Diskussionen über die Cybersicherheit zu sehr die Gefahren im Vordergrund stehen; und er erklärt, wie ein nachhaltiger Umgang mit dem Thema aussehen könnte. Details...
Crowdfunding in der Schweiz zeigt hohes Wachstum / Tips for Investors
Der Crowdfunding Markt in der Schweiz wächst stark an. Im IFZ Blog Crowdfunding in der Schweiz mit hohem Wachstum berichten Prof. Dr. Andreas Dietrich und Simon Amrein über die Resultate der zum dritten Mal durchgeführten Studie «Crowdfunding Monitoring Schweiz», die erstmals auch Beweggründe von Projektunterstützenden analysiert. Details… (Link zur Studie)
Many start-up companies are trying to raise money using equity crowdfunding. What should an everyday investor look for as he chooses a company to fund?
In the GTNews article Crowdfunding: Five basic tips for investors, Amro Albanna, CEO is chief of ieCrowd, a US start-up with six years of experience and over US$17m already raised through angel investors, suggests these key points for crowdfunding investors:
- Already raised capital
- Has a board of directors
- Knows how to deal with investors
- Diversifies its offerings
- Has an exit plan
From the Desk of Regula Spottl, Greensboro, NC, USA
The most important question in managing people is how can we create meaning. When dealing with problems at work, it’s a matter of clarifying issues so they make sense. From a communication perspective (my specialty), a major reason for employees’ disillusionment is that they don’t know why their work is significant or even necessary and how it fits into the department’s and the company’s value creation. A start to solve this is to give them an overview of their boss’s role and responsibilities, so they see how they contribute and the boss depends on them.
So putting a particular job in the context of the company’s reason for being is necessary. Another way to create meaning is to tell a story. Part of our story is the connection to flight and airplanes. That was the reason for the recent special newsletter on the Iron Maiden’s landing at Zurich airport. In addition to being a finance pro, Martin is also a pilot and looks at the world from that angle.
As summer approaches and you escape the work routine, you’ll find that work takes up space in your head. Don’t compress it, but put it in perspective and along the way, things may look more manageable. Enjoy it and let yourself be energized by it.
Enjoy the summer break!