Best Banks for Liquidity Management
North America
J.P. Morgan
In 2010, J.P. Morgan Treasury Services rolled out the bank’s “integrated global liquidity platform,” J.P. Morgan ACCESS Liquidity Solutions, which provides customers with an overview of their global multicurrency cash and investments. Information can be sliced and diced in a number of ways (legal entity, country, currency, third-party balances). Customers can also view and manage cash concentration structures and initiate investments. When advising clients on how best to manage their liquidity, J.P. Morgan can also draw on capabilities within its asset management division. It is also devising solutions to help customers manage liquidity in this heightened regulatory environment.
Western Europe
Royal Bank of Scotland
With liquidity management being more important than ever, RBS continues to provide customers with a wide range of options for managing their excess liquidity, including deposit accounts for providing higher yields on excess liquidity, cross-currency notional pooling and cash concentration solutions that enable companies to sweep excess cash between regions for same-day value. It is also helping clients better manage their liquidity using its multibank cash concentration solution. Further enhancements to its liquidity management and investment offerings are expected in the coming year.
Asia
Standard Chartered
Standard Chartered says it was the first in the industry to offer cross-border, cross-currency notional pooling in 16 markets, including countries such as China, Malaysia and Thailand, where restrictions are often imposed on capital movements. Its global notional aggregation solution sets it apart as it enables companies to optimize interest across five regions—Asia, Middle East, Africa, Europe and the US—by aggregating balances from Asia with those in other regions, which is particularly pertinent in the current low-interest-rate environment. Standard Chartered is also leveraging its Islamic banking expertise to develop liquidity management solutions that are shariah-compliant.
Latin America
Citi
Citi says it operates one of the most comprehensive liquidity management networks offering customers a wide range of solutions for managing their liquidity regionally and globally, including sweeping and interest optimization, and operating a number of liquidity and investment desks across countries such as Argentina, Brazil and Mexico. Its award-winning TreasuryVision solution now includes an intercompany lending module, which enables companies to centralize all internal lending and borrowing in one location. TreasuryVision also provides customers with access to the bank’s investment portal, and across the region companies are using its solutions to help centralize and gain greater control over their cash and liquidity.
Central & Eastern Europe
UniCredit
Cash pooling across CEE is one of UniCredit’s strengths, and it continues to invest in rolling out pooling to a number of markets. It says it has the largest cash-pooling network for zero balancing in the region and boasts hundreds of pooling structures with master accounts residing in the CEE. As of December 2010 it experienced a 30% year-on-year increase in the number of cash pools. It offers local and cross-border cash pooling as well as target balancing and notional pooling.
Nordic Region
SEB
SEB’s corporate financial value chain helps companies optimize and benchmark different parts of their financial supply chain against industry best practice, helping companies to free up and optimize working capital. It has also developed more tightly integrated treasury functionality within its online platform by incorporating its foreign exchange trading and cash forecasting capabilities in its online offerings. SEB has enhanced and strengthened its cash management even further by working to more closely integrate the different skill sets and competencies across its global transaction services division, which encompasses cash and trade, with its corporate financial value chain.
Middle East
HSBC
HSBC is helping a number of multinational companies optimize their liquidity management across the Middle East, including its first cross-border cash concentration client in the MENA region. Leveraging its partnership with SABB Bank in Saudi Arabia, it rolled out notional pooling and cash concentration solutions to customers in that market. Customers in markets such as Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Lebanon and Pakistan are also benefiting from the bank’s development of its global liquidity engine, which will provide them with cross-currency as well as consistent and standardized capabilities.
Africa
Standard Chartered
Standard Chartered’s liquidity management solutions address a range of sophisticated client needs, including notional pooling and interest aggregation. Its global notional aggregation solution means clients can aggregate local balances with those from other locations to optimize interest. Customers in the region can also benefit from its investment in a single-instance global liquidity management platform, which it invested in some years ago. Surveys have shown it to have one of the most comprehensive liquidity management offerings when it comes to single and multicurrency notional pools and sweeping services.
Best Treasury and Cash Management Providers 2011:
