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Interested in comparing your performance to your corporate treasury peers in Europe? The second annual AFP Treasury Benchmarking Survey for the first time includes data from European corporate treasurers. This year’s participants included members of AFP as well as subscribers to London-based gtnews, an AFP company and on-line resource for the treasury and finance community, doubling respondents to this year’s survey to more than 800 organizations. AFP, IBM and Deutsche Bank collaborated on the 2009 AFP Treasury Benchmarking Survey.

According to the survey, deploying automated systems can reduce cycle times and staffing requirements, especially for cash management activities.

Additional findings include:
Treasury Costs – The smaller the organization, the more intensive the investment is for treasury operations relative to revenue. Also, the financial services industry tends to incur the highest level of FTEs and costs. This is likely due to the regulatory requirements and strategic emphasis on cash management. In other words, financial services organizations view treasury as a competitive differentiator.

Full-Time Treasury Equivalents - The smaller the organization, the more FTEs are required to conduct treasury operations relative to revenue. The financial services industry tends to employ higher FTE levels.

Treasury Cycle Times - With a few exceptions, size is not a significant predictor of cycle time, suggesting that size does indicate overall complexity when other factors are constant. Financial services tend to have lower average and benchmark cycle times than those of other industry groups.

You can download the executive summary of the 2009 AFP Treasury Benchmarking Survey.

Only 11 percent of CFOs, treasurers and other treasury and finance executives representing companies of a median size of $1.5 billion in annual revenues believe that the U.S. economy is out of the recession, according to an onsite survey of 982 attendees conducted Monday at the 2009 Association for Financial Professionals’ Annual Conference in San Francisco. Just 20 percent of survey respondents believe the recession will end before of the year, while 69 percent expect the recession will continue well into 2010.

“AFP members have played a critical role in maintaining the financial stability of their organizations through the recession,” said Jim Kaitz, president and CEO of AFP. “As we look ahead, AFP will continue to work with policymakers to ensure that financial regulatory reform is balanced and represents the needs of financial professionals. We are confident that responsible regulation will foster stable and secure financial markets.”

Twenty-two percent expect company payrolls to shrink further while just 14 percent anticipate that their organization will resume hiring over the next six months. Just 21 percent of financial professionals anticipate their organization will increase capital spending in the next six months.

One bright spot from the survey: access to capital. More than half of respondents indicate that their organizations’ access to capital stabilized over the past six months, and 31 percent of organizations have had improved access to debt markets over the past six months. Access to banking lending has improved for 22 percent of respondents while a similar percentage report improvements in raising capital in the equity markets.

A new survey from AFP’s Annual Conference floor in San Francisco offers a clear “indiciation of the cautiousness” of financial professionals as economic instability continues, AFP’s President and CEO Jim Kaitz told CNBC this morning. Here is the video link from CNBC:

CFOs Dispute End of Recession Call

Of the 982 finance and treasury executives that responded to a Monday survey, just 11 percent believe the U.S. has emerged from recession. The survey’s respondents include CFOs and treasurers from companies with median annual revenues of $1.5 billion. Find more of the survey’s results here.

Copyright © 2009 | Association for Financial Professionals, Inc. | All rights reserved.

The smaller the organization, the more intensive the investment is for treasury operations relative to revenue, according to the 2009 Association for Financial Professionals’ Treasury Benchmarking Survey.

AFP conducted its second annual benchmarking survey to let financial professionals compare the performance of their organization’s treasury operation to that of their peers and top performers. AFP, IBM and Deutsche Bank collaborated again on the 2009 AFP Benchmarking Survey, which expanded to include corporates based in Europe. This year’s participants included AFP members as well as subscribers to London-based gtnews, an AFP company and on-line resource for the treasury and finance community, doubling respondents to this year’s survey to more than 800 organizations.

Marilyn Spearing, Head of Trade Finance and Cash Management Corporates, Global Transaction Banking, Deutsche Bank, said, “Deutsche Bank is pleased to support the further expansion of this important peer group survey. We received very favorable responses from those U.S. corporates who participated in the initial survey that we looked to obtain this data on a cross-regional level. The theme of this year’s survey, ‘Optimal Delivery of Treasury Services,’ is particularly timely as treasurers in today’s market are seeking opportunities to compare the performance of organizations’ treasury operations against those of their peers.”

Other highlights from the 34-page public report, released Sunday at AFP’s 2009 Annual Conference in San Francisco:

Full-Time Treasury Equivalents. The smaller the organization, the more FTEs are required to conduct treasury operations relative to revenue. The financial services industry tends to employ higher FTE levels.

Treasury Cycle Times. With a few exceptions, size is not a significant predictor of cycle time, suggesting that size does indicate overall complexity when other factors are constant. Financial services tend to have lower average and benchmark cycle times than those of other industry groups.

Complete survey results are available here.

U.S. corporations prefer ACH and card payments to checks when making or receiving B2B transactions, according to new research from the Federal Reserve and comments from AFP’s Payments Advisory Group and senior executives with the Fed’s Financial Services Support Office. That’s a notable change in their views since the two groups held a similar meeting held in 2004. (more…)

Executives planning to increase their overseas sales targets rose from 49 percent in 2008 to 56 percent in 2009, according to the HSBC 2009 U.S. Survey on International Business. For the majority of the respondents, markets such as China, India and Brazil are the most attractive.

More than half of the survey respondents have policies that involve both hedged and un-hedged risks, and 41 percent indicated they are managing foreign exchange risk more carefully.

Read more in the upcoming issue of Exchange magazine.

On May 29, 2009, President Barack Obama released the results of a 60 day review of Federal cybersecurity policy and a list of action steps to be taken by his administration….

For the full article, see  President Obama Announces Major Cybersecurity Reforms