The future of treasury: From back office to strategic forefront

SPEAKER_1 (0:04)

Hello, Making Sense listeners. Today, we're handing over the feed to EMEA In Conversation, a JPMorgan podcast with industry leaders on what's happening across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Making Sense will return to its regular schedule in the next episode. But for now, enjoy this special episode from JPMorgan's EMEA In Conversation.

Roxana Montazerian (0:25)

For a second, imagine you're walking into Treasury Department 10 years ago.

You would probably see teams focused on cash positioning, payments, funding and risk management. Now imagine walking into the same Treasury Department today. You will find discussions about AI, instant payments, cyber resilience, predictive analytics and data.

Treasury hasn't just evolved, it has fundamentally changed. And that's what today's conversation is about. I'm Roxana Montazerian, EMEA Head of Broker Dealer and Specialty Finance Sales. And I'm joined by Sara Castelhano, Head of UK, Europe and Canada Treasury Services at JPMorgan. Welcome, Sara.

Sara Castelhano (1:10)

Thank you, Roxy. It's a pleasure to be here.

Roxana Montazerian (1:12)

Sara, before we dive into the conversation, I would love to start somewhere a little different. If Treasury had a different job title, what would it be?

Sara Castelhano (1:21)

I'd probably say Chief Connector.

Treasury sits at the epicenter between risk, liquidity, business growth, innovation, and big transformational programs. They are really that key to bringing the full business together.

Roxana Montazerian (1:39)

We've seen such a shift in the roles and responsibilities of a treasurer. I would say even the profile of treasurer has changed. The personas have changed. We are seeing different skill set required for the treasurers. Now as you speak to clients and based on your previous experiences, are you also seeing the same thing?

Different personas, are they seeing as a buying center?

Sara Castelhano (2:04)

Yeah, absolutely. I would say that treasury has evolved from being a back office function to be really at the forefront of strategy. And if we think about just business shifts, geopolitical changes, the complexity in managing the money of a company, that has significantly changed. And then you layer on things like innovation, technology, artificial intelligence, and then risks around cyber fraud, etc.

The job of a treasurer is not just, let's put a position, let's look at a report. It's really about how do I protect my company, but also how do I help the company succeed with future growth.

Roxana Montazerian (2:45)

And there's so much for a treasurer to think about, as you mentioned, so they've become far more strategic.

What we're saying is that they're working far closer with CFOs and executive committees as well. And as you mentioned, there's so much for them to think about. Their business models are becoming far more complex, global in nature. And that complexity brings risk to the business. What are your thoughts with regards to firms such as us supporting the treasurers when they're thinking about all of these ambitions? Do they need to compromise some of that when it comes to, for example, resilience?

Sara Castelhano (3:25)

Absolutely. I would go and say that everything you do, resiliency is at the core of it. Because if you can't make a transaction or you can't necessarily support the CEO or CFO when they ask you a question, that's really a fault. And I would say that the days of looking at yesterday's positions today are long gone. And today, what is more important is getting access to real time information. And that real time information is not just let's get the information. It's how does that information lead to insights? And how can Treasury make more strategic decisions to ultimately help the company's bottom line? Also, I would say that from a corporate treasurer perspective, being able to help expand into new markets or manage acquisitions becomes more important for Treasury than ever before.

Roxana Montazerian (4:25)

I mean, you've shared a lot and there is so much we can unpack during this conversation. What we continuously hear from clients is, how can I expand internationally? As I speak to many of our clients, especially the ones that are fitting more towards the new entrance sector, such as Fintech. We are hearing a lot about the global expansion plans, moving into different markets.

But one really key theme that is coming through is, how can we grow globally, receive a consistent and harmonized global services, but yet remain with a local feel and experience, especially for the end customer? What are your views on that? How are we supporting clients?

Sara Castelhano (5:07)

Absolutely. So, payments are local. And when you think about payments, you need to make sure that you're understanding the local market.

And that's from an individual, how they pay in a country. I think that expansion is really, really key to focus on the local means, but also recognize that regulation is different country by country. So understanding that you want to provide a global experience with that local relevance, it's quite hard. From my perspective, I do think that where you can act global is being with a banking partner that already has that experience, because ultimately, in order to move payments borderless, you need a really consistent offering.