Banking partners help optimize cash flow and protect its value.
Faced with high interest rates and inflation, companies in Western Europe are turning to their banking partners to find ways to optimize cash flow and protect its value.
Societe Generale, our winner this year as Best Bank for Transaction Banking, has developed a Sustainable GTB (global transaction banking) Framework—one of the first dedicated to asset-based GTB solutions—to enhance the ability of the bank and its clients to assess and monitor the environmental and social impacts of their day-to-day working capital, trade, and liquidity management. “It is particularly intended for corporate treasurers, who have a crucial role to play in the corporates’ ESG strategy but who are currently facing the absence of mature market standards for sustainable GTB solutions while having a growing need to quantify the impact of their transactions and fulfill corresponding reporting requirements,” explains David Abitbol, head of Global Transaction and Payment Services at Societe Generale.
He says the framework provides clear and transparent definitions of sustainable GTB solutions (those that can be considered green, social, etc.) and the associated requirements that apply at both client and transaction levels. It specifies activities with positive environmental and/or social impacts (such as renewable energy projects, clean transportation, or sustainable wastewater management) covered by trade finance instruments or short-term financing. Monitoring will include reporting on impact indicators such as CO2 emissions avoided; renewable-energy-produced MWh; passengers or tonnes per kilometer; or annual amount of wastewater treated, reused, or avoided—both before and after the project.
This framework is based on an efficient and transparent ESG-qualification process made public and available to clients. The bank said in a statement, “This methodology has been established in the spirit of best market practices, such as the Green or Social Loan Principles, while considering the specificities of GTB.”
In addition to the Benelux region (Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg), Best Bank for Cash Management award winner ING is well positioned in Germany and Ireland. A leading supply chain finance provider in Benelux in terms of volume and the number of existing programs, ING continues to develop its footprint within the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, and the Nordics.
With a large international network, BNP Paribas, which takes the award for Best Corporate Cross-Border Payments Solution, boasts an extensive reach to facilitate smooth cross-border transactions. This is bolstered by expertise in foreign exchange and in real-time tracking and management of cross-border payments.
Matthew Davies is head of Global Payments Solutions (GPS) for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa and global co-head of GPS Corporate Sales at Bank of America (BofA), winner of two awards this year, as Best Bank for Payments and Best Bank for Collections. He says BofA is constantly looking at ways to provide its clients with more insights into their data, including payments-based insights.
“It means they can be much more autonomous and predictive with understanding all of their different payment flows,” states Davies. “They can uncover if payments are optimized, being sent on the most appropriate rails, where they are, and if they are duplicating payments to suppliers in different parts of the world, etc.”
Nordea, the winner as Best Bank for Long-Term Liquidity Management, can help treasurers optimize their liquidity and gain more visibility and control over their cash, with the added benefit of real-time reporting and constant transparency of their liquidity position.
Sustainable finance is another key area in which banks are showing the way across Europe. The Best Provider of Short-Term Investments/Money Market Funds, Royal London Asset Management, manages $9.2 billion. Royal London Short Term Money Market Fund, a low-risk investment option, yielding 5.5% over the past year, with high liquidity and good ESG credentials. Companies are also exploring the potential of new technologies like open banking application programming interfaces (APIs) for efficient data exchange and streamlined payments. BofA has over 1,600 API clients globally and this continues to grow. Davies says clients are using APIs more to get real-time access to information—constantly pulling data and transactions, for example, to embed in their own systems.
| Western Europe | |
|---|---|
| Best Bank for Transaction Banking* | Societe Generale |
| Best Bank for Cash Management | ING |
| Best Corporate Cross-Border Payments Solution* | BNP Paribas |
| Best Bank for Payments | Bank of America |
| Best Bank for Collections | Bank of America |
| Best Bank for Long-Term Liquidity Management | Nordea |
| Best Provider of Short-Term Investments/Money Market Funds |
Royal London Asset Management |
