Teil 1: die Entwicklung des Treasury Managements seit 1997 v
It was often accountants or employees of banks and savings banks who, due to their prior knowledge in the financial sector, were entrusted with the task of securing and managing a company’s liquidity. However, it was not uncommon—especially in small and medium-sized businesses—for management itself to handle this matter, as financial matters in Germany have always been treated with the utmost confidentiality. If someone had successfully built up a company over the years, it was difficult for him or her to entrust the management of the finances to others.
In growing businesses, however, the task of checking bank statement entries and balances often became so extensive that it was quickly handed over to the accounting department. In multinational companies, the reconciliation of individual accounts was often handled decentralized, and the overall view of the financial situation remained with management. To plan for future liquidity, one had to rely on information from many different sources and one’s own intuition. Missing or incorrect information easily led to poor decisions.
New forms of financing and financial innovations for interest rate and currency hedging or investment made professional financial management increasingly complex and overwhelmed both business leaders and accountants, especially since they already had plenty of other tasks to handle. It was therefore time to counter the banks’ specialists with experts on the corporate side. Since there were no treasurers yet and the job description was not clearly defined, companies often turned to credit institutions for assistance. Bankers moved into the corporate sector, but some accountants also took an interest in this exciting field and independently expanded their knowledge of electronic banking, cash management, and risk management.
These pioneers soon realized that they could make their jobs more enjoyable by acting in solidarity. They needed a lobby to, on the one hand, stand up to the considerable power of the financial institutions and, on the other hand, to make the importance of their position clear to senior management within their own companies. The latter was particularly necessary to secure the appropriate budgets for setting up a functional workplace. While the initial focus was on introducing a multi-bank-compatible electronic banking system and transitioning from faxed cover sheets to electronic signatures, larger companies quickly began implementing cash and treasury management systems with numerous integrated modules for recording and managing all of the company’s financial transactions. Trinity’s practical solutions were already in high demand 25 years ago.
In particular, manager-led companies now had, in addition to the CEO, a Chief Financial Officer (CFO) serving as the financial officer, who was authorized to assemble a treasury team. In some companies, this was a one-person operation; in others, there were several front-, middle-, and back-office positions. Such departments had to operate efficiently and were often established as profit centers in the early days. Due to high interest margins and transaction costs, it was necessary to realize cost-saving potential. Subsequently, bank accounts worldwide were reviewed for necessity, and their number was reduced to a minimum. Finally, consideration was given to how further costs could be saved through efficient process design—for example, by consolidating similar activities into shared service centers. The centralized retrieval and reconciliation of account information and the execution of payment transactions for all subsidiaries became the focus of projects—some of which were very complex—that only achieved the desired success if sufficient expertise was available when the requirements specification was drawn up.
The “Big Four” and other auditing firms formed specialized teams to advise corporate treasury management; in some cases, companies were even founded that focused primarily on selecting the right financing strategy, process design, supporting software systems, and even taking over certain financial management tasks.
Corporate treasury experienced a veritable boom in the early 2000s, which also attracted foreign treasury system providers. National and international conferences and trade shows brought together CFOs, corporate treasurers, financial and credit institutions, software providers, and other specialized service providers. There were only a few treasury management systems, such as Trinity TMS, that were developed in Germany. Most solutions came from the U.S., the U.K., or France and often failed to meet the needs of German treasurers, as file formats for account information and payment orders, as well as technical communication and authorization procedures, differed from country to country and could not be harmonized without time-consuming conversion from one format to another.
Prior to the introduction of SEPA in 2014, all German credit institutions had agreed on a uniform DTA standard for payments and the SWIFT MT940 format for account statements, and had created a practical and secure communication and authorization standard with EBICS (Electronic Banking Internet Standard) and electronic signatures —neighboring countries, however, mostly stuck to their national procedures and data exchange formats.
With the help of the Association of German Treasurers (Verband Deutscher Treasurer e.V.), which was founded in 1997—the same year Trinity Management Systems GmbH was established—members were able to discuss problems and, in many cases, develop solutions. This mix of experienced corporate treasurers, dedicated young finance managers, representatives from universities, software providers, consulting firms, and financial institutions has formed a competent and influential lobby for the concerns of treasurers in Germany, supporting their interests not only within Germany but also beyond its borders.
Trinity has been a supporting member since 1998 and actively supports the association through personal commitment and the continuous exchange of knowledge. We are delighted to celebrate this 25th anniversary together with the VDT e.V. this year and wish the Association of German Treasurers all the best and continued success for the next 25 years!
To this end, Trinity has for years offered customized “private cloud” installations in German data centers to relieve the burden on customers’ IT resources while complying with EU data protection directives and the GDPR.
Trinity TMS is developed and maintained in Germany with a wealth of expertise. Customer inquiries are handled directly by Trinity, fostering a personal relationship between our employees and users. The German team is supported by a project office in the Netherlands, as Trinity’s client base now includes many companies based in both Eastern and Western Europe.
Trinity has demonstrated consistency for 25 years, and this will continue into the future. Tailored to each customer, experienced, fast, and personal.
