The 3 Fundamental Treasury Concepts: Transfer Pricing

14-12-2022 | Vasu Reddy | treasuryXL | LinkedIn |

The 3 fundamental treasury concepts being discussed currently include Working Capital Management, Bank Relationships and Treasury Transfer Pricing which are pivotal pillars for effectively and efficiently optimizing cash, liquidity,  funding and managing risk for any Treasury function to support the achievement of the organizations business objectives and strategy. In the second blog of a series of 3, Vasu Reddy explains the best practices and benefits of Treasury Transfer Pricing.

Intercollegiate loans and intercollegiate services MUST be billed and charged at a market rate – i.e. as you would bill/pay a third party to avoid tax risk and margin loss.

How to price loans and how is service charge billing done?

  • The price of a loan can be obtained from partner banks, financial institutions and the market, using the central bank rate of the borrowing LE as a benchmark and taking into account the borrowing LE’s creditworthiness, balance sheet strength and currency of the loan based on standardised inter-loan agreements.
  • The billing of service charges by head office to OPCOs is based on time commitment, transaction volume or actual costs incurred plus a margin – this is usually the difference between the market rate and the risk-free rate and may be agreed with the tax authorities.

What are the benefits of good managing of Transfer Pricing?

  • Reduced Tax Risk
  • Reduced margin Risk
  • Improved Cash repatriation and concentration
  • Accurate cost allocation and recovery
  • Reduced Trapped Cash

 

Thank you for reading. If you want more explanation, I’d be happy to help!


 

Vasu Reddy

Corporate Treasury, Finance Executive

The 3 Fundamental Treasury Concepts: Bank Relationships

29-11-2022 | Vasu Reddy | treasuryXL | LinkedIn |

The 3 fundamental treasury concepts being discussed currently include Working Capital Management, Bank Relationships and Treasury Transfer Pricing which are pivotal pillars for effectively and efficiently optimizing cash, liquidity,  funding and managing risk for any Treasury function to support the achievement of the organizations business objectives and strategy. In the second blog of a series of 3, Vasu Reddy explains the best practices and benefits of Bank Relationships.

Strong Bank relationships (including Central Banks) are key to operating successfully in any country- locally, regionally or Globally.

When selecting and maintaining bank relationships, it is key to include partners with strong track record including:

  • Strong Bank Credit rating  – BBB+ to  AA+
  • Strong Bank Balance sheet, assets size and Cash Reserves,
  • Strong Ethics, Governance, Compliance
  • Bank Geographical Footprint
  • Huge Product knowledge, expertise and offering
  • Strong Service capability and rapid response times
  • Competitive Pricing and transparency
  • Being a trusted advisor – including investment banking, FX, etc.
  • Advanced  technology and systems and Project support
  • Managing confidentiality of information and conflicts of interest
  • Strong Relationship with Central Bank for Advocation
  • Going above and beyond for client during drastic times– providing credit sufficient lines
  • Accepting Clients standardized documentation in different countries due to regional      relationship
  • Ease of doing business – bank account opening, KYC onboarding, Projects, system implementation,  integration with  ERP, TMS, RFP’s, RFQ’s , legal issues, etc.

More key considerations are:

– Size of Corporate/business

– Credit rating/balance sheet size

– Growth Plans – M&A, etc.

– # of bank relationships

-# of bank accounts

-# of Legal Entities

-Bank interaction, performance and evaluation

 

Maintain a good central bank relationship is key”  Vasu Reddy

What are the benefits of good bank relationships?

  • Smooth Business operation with no disruption resulting in improved cash flow, profits and reduced costs
  • Management able to focus on business growth and sustainability
  • Minimal bank law compliance risks
  • Able to pivot easily during macro-economic cycles – surviving recessions, political risks, etc.

 

Thank you for reading!


 

Vasu Reddy

Corporate Treasury, Finance Executive

The 3 Fundamental Treasury Concepts: Working Capital Management

17-11-2022 | Vasu Reddy | treasuryXL | LinkedIn |

The 3 fundamental treasury concepts being discussed currently include Working Capital Management, Bank Relationships and Treasury Transfer Pricing which are pivotal pillars for effectively and efficiently optimizing cash, liquidity,  funding and managing risk for any Treasury function to support the achievement of the organizations business objectives and strategy. In the current blog of a series of 3, Vasu Reddy explains the best practices and benefits of Working Capital Management.

Trade and Working Capital Management Products offered by banks

Working Capital Management involves working with supply, purchase, procurement, production, delivery and sales.

What are the best practices to improve working capital balances?

  • Letter of Credits for imports, Bank Guarantees instead of cash prepayments, Documentary Collections
  • Trade loans, overdrafts
  • Structured Trade and commodity finance
  • Supplier/commercial Finance – including ESG – Green Bonds 
  • Bills & LC Discounting to improve cash collection
  • Receivables Discounting to monetize cash and reduce past dues with poor paying customers with no recourse
  • Securitization of receivables on customer contracts executed mainly by Mobile operators 
  • Selling Debt to off-taker/3rd parties with minimal haircut  
  • Procurement/Travel credit cards

Benefits from these practices

  • Trade finance improves working capital Efficiency, reduces borrowing costs and enhances cash flow.

What are the best practices for Cash and Liquidity Management?

  • Implementation and use of Online banking –Centralized single banking platform across region of operation
  • Robust cash planning and forecasting policies to ensure accurate cash flow forecasting by  working with Accounts Receivables, Payables and FP&A teams including businesses to submit monthly forecasts with post month-end review discussions to understand any material variations and investigation thereof. This must be CFO Endorsed to get overall Treasury, Finance, business collaboration. 
  • Overnight/Money market deposits – Invest excess surplus cash 
  • Structured Cash Sweeping/Cash Pooling arrangements for all LE’s – to minimize having excess cash in one country and simultaneously having borrowing in another country
  • Interest Optimization structures with Regional/Global banks to take advantage of wallet size 

“Cash is the life blood to sustain operations”  Vasu Reddy


Benefits from these practices

  • Reduced Borrowings/overdrafts, increased income 
  • Cash Visibility and improved  reporting and financial planning– Group Level 
  • Strong credit rating – improved Shareholder relationship/Returns
  • Strong positive cash flow and Balance sheet – Higher Dividend distribution
  • Cost savings, reduced manual interventions – errors, reduced head-count

Thank you for reading!


 

Vasu Reddy

Corporate Treasury, Finance Executive

Ask the treasuryXL expert #2 How can I efficiently and cost-effectively get central bank approval/advice for cross-border flows in cash-strapped countries without delaying my business?

treasuryXL is the community platform for everyone with a treasury question or answer! Today, we discuss a question that treasuryXL expert Vasu Reddy often hears within his treasury network. The question relates to challenges for Treasury in Emerging Markets that most corporates continue to experience.

27-07-2022 | treasuryXL Vasu Reddy | LinkedIn |

Question:  “How can I efficiently and cost-effectively get central bank approval/advice for cross-border flows in cash-strapped countries without delaying my business?”


Answer (by Vasu Reddy)


“This is a common question I receive. It is related to emerging market challenges for treasury that most corporates still experience. Examples of these emerging markets include Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS)

My idea is to proactively submit an application in advance. This application should indicate the nature and scope of the transaction, the benefits to the company, and the impact on the country (including currency and cash implications). Furthermore, it should include the reasons for not sourcing locally, the basis for the costing, and supporting documents such as supplier agreements, shipping documents, etc.

If it is a recurring remittance, such as royalties or monthly Global service charges, then a special dispensation should be applied for (renewed annually) to avoid individual applications resulting in increased costs, efforts and delays.

The best approach is to work closely with your authorized dealer, who is your main partner bank and who has strong links with the Central Bank, has automated systems and is fully aware of regulatory changes. ”

Vasu Reddy



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Navigating emerging markets with a corporate treasury hat

09-06-2022 | Vasu Reddy | treasuryXL | LinkedIn |

 

Unlike many developed markets, like the US, which has 50 states, a single currency, single banking platform, one government, one central bank and monetary policy with no cash and currency restrictions, a developed global banking footprint and infrastructure Sub-Sharan Africa has the inverse, 25 countries, 25 different currencies and banking platforms, 25 different Central banks including monetary policies, 21 of which has strict Exchange control rules requiring prior approvals and document submissions for repatriation.

Article written by Vasu Reddy

 

What makes Corporate Treasury difficult in Africa

Doing business in Africa is an extremely long marathon and not for the faint-hearted. When your day-to-day activities are always faced with different risks and complexities, unforeseen and uncertain changes, and challenges in regulation and commercial environments with moving targets, one needs to be focused on the bigger picture about survival and growing the business and investment in the long term growth.

Overseeing a region spanning 25 countries with the Finance hubs being South Africa, Nigeria, Angola, Ghana, and Kenya and the latter being a Centre of Excellence for the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa, my main responsibilities included providing strategic and operational Treasury leadership with a focus on developing cash, liquidity and banking strategies, Developing and maintaining Banking relationships, Funding/capital and Debt structuring, Bank negotiation, Bank facility/documentation finalization, foreign exchange and Exposure management, Credit and Market Risk, Trade and Transaction solutions, Commercial/Project financing and Exchange Control and bank regulatory/compliance. Reporting into Corporate Treasury offshore with a dotted line into Africa CFO based in Kenya.

Apart from resilience and grit, one must operate adopting the “Lean” principles to ensure that the Leader navigates with focus, inclusiveness, integrity, transparency, and collaboration leveraging on operational excellence, world-class fit for purpose innovative solutions, technologies, and relationships leading the cross-functional diverse teams across multiple geographies and cultures across the different business verticals and functional areas operating in complex and challenging markets within a matrix organization that is impactful and exceeds business objectives.


 

Vasu joined GE from Chevron Oil Inc, South Africa where he was the Senior Treasury Manager, covering South & Central Africa for 7 years, and before that was at Land and Development Bank of SA before spending 6 years at Woolworths Holdings Ltd in various Treasury and Accounting roles. He is a highly experienced professional with 25 years’ Treasury, banking and Finance experience having worked in Multinational companies in Retail, Banking, Oil & Gas sectors, and diversified industries and capital.

Vasu’s academic background includes a Bachelor of Commerce (Accounting) degree, an Honours degree in Financial Management from the University of Cape Town, Postgraduate Diploma in Accounting from the University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. Vasu has completed the Leadership Executive Program (LEP) at the Graduate School of Business, Cape Town. Vasu has attended Advanced leadership courses at the GE Institute of Management, Crontonville, New York. Vasu is a member of the Association of Corporate Treasurers, South Africa, and a Certified Treasury professional with the Association of Financial Professionals, USA. He has been on various Treasury Community webinars and panel discussions/presentations at the Euro Finance, London.

The move into Treasury from Accounting seemed exciting with each day being different since it is more forward-looking and has external bank collaborations rather than the mere recording of past transactions. Although Treasury could be characterized as a more specialized function to some finance professionals, It entailed being pro-active, forward-looking,  engaging with banks and financial institutions, keeping abreast of market dynamics, and providing advice and information on critical business decision making on a real-time basis which would have major impacts on the future business profitability.

 


Surviving the Challenges

Africa is a tough market to operate in and will always be considered an “emerging market” due to the infrastructure challenges and political climate, however, it would seem lucrative due to its ever-growing population and need for products and services. Many large Corporates including South African listed Multinationals looked to Africa for Growth expansion wanting to grow their businesses and increase shareholder value, to only experience huge challenges ranging from Supply-chain disruptions and delays, slow business responses, High costs of doing business, poor credit rating customers and banks, strict and changing regulation, lack of Foreign currency for repatriation resulting in huge trapped cash, delays with Central bank approvals, poor technology, and manual intervention, lack of global banking presence, lack of customer deal financing, political risks, highly cyclical commodity-driven markets that lack diversification for currency flow and with lots of red tape with no focus on developing policies to encourage and welcome foreign investment.

“A Treasurer needs to always be proactive, thinking consistently “out of the box”, and consistently exploring innovative ways to pivot”


As a Treasurer/CFO, one should understand that these challenges will not disappear any time soon. One needs to always be proactive, thinking consistently “out of the box”, and consistently exploring innovative ways to pivot. When global corporations execute deals in Africa, end-to-end due diligence needs to be performed not just on pure profitability and return on investment but considering the holistic cash repatriation risks and costs including detailed country analysis involved per deal. This is due to the common shortage of foreign currency liquidity that is required to repatriate cash for imports, inter-co loans settlements, dividends, etc. In most markets, the flow of currency and exchange rate is controlled by the Central Bank. In 2015, with the oil price crash, and in 2020 with the Covid 19 pandemic, the trapped cash balances increased due to the US Dollar currency shortage because of poor foreign flows. Corporates needed to work proactively with their multiple banking partners to source foreign currency liquidity, where in some cases we had to ringfence our export proceeds with the banking partner and place orders strategically in the foreign currency queue to secure foreign currency which was used to settle the outgoing foreign currency payments in countries like Nigeria and Angola. Other alternatives involved banking multiple partners who bank the large exporters that have access to foreign currency liquidity in countries such as Mozambique and Ethiopia, however considering that proper credit risk analysis was performed on these banks. Other alternatives in 2015 involved working with Export Finance Agencies to provide a guarantee to the local Government through refinancing of exports from the UK to Angola where this foreign currency liquidity via an inward loan to the Government would be used for repatriation and the Debt with the local government will be sold Offshore with the proceeds being received offshore. Due to its complexity, the local government was not open to execution

Partnership and Playing by Rules

Since reputation risk and compliance is more apparent now than ever with Multinationals, it is paramount to ensure that the rules are strictly adhered to by the regulatory authorities since the operations in Africa were always seen as a long-term investment to grow the current businesses, considering that Africa presented incredulous growth opportunities for the foreseeable future. Regular meetings with Central Banks were held by Treasury and with Governments by Senior leadership to forge a collaborative partnership with a focus on investments in localization through manufacturing and assembling sites, job creation, and help in building infrastructure.

 

Another critical Treasury partnership is the global, regional, and local banks. Large Multinationals have a preferred bank partner list based on their global relationships, balance sheet size, market presence, and risk and credit rating. The challenge is that not all the Global banks have a presence in all African countries, In Ethiopia, the local market is closed to foreign banks. The preferred option was the order to an initial bank with a Global bank, then a regional bank, and lastly a local bank or if required by a localization law. An example in mind is Ghana, where you were required to have an account with an indigenous bank if you wanted to bid for local business.  The advantages of partnering with the Global banks offered multiple layers of contact points for escalation and efficiency, prompt service responses, interest optimization options and economies of scale benefits, universal language on trade finance, guarantees and facilities including bank mandates, negotiable price to book fees, straight to bank processing, access to US Dollar flows, etc.

 

Technology and Digitization    

Digitization and automation are pivotal for the future of Treasury and especially in Africa as this will ensure simplification, efficiency and effectiveness, cost reduction, faster response, and a more controlled and structured banking environment with fewer errors and risk of fraud. This should be coupled with AI to centralize processes as much as possible. Africa’s banking processes and platforms have room for development on technology advancements and the Covid’19 pandemic has forced most countries to rethink investing in technology and upscaling.

 

Ears close to the ground

Due to the diverse and extremely challenging banking operations, one requires strong technical competence, effective communication skills, consistently researching innovative ideas, and close relationships. One will find it challenging to manage the African operations with an “Arm-Chair” Treasurer sitting offshore. You would need to be close to the business operations, and functional teams like tax, legal, and banking teams on the ground. Whether one is researching a structured inter-co loan via a cross-currency swap, local hedge solution mitigating Zimbabwe hyperinflation, securing foreign currency in Mozambique, buying/selling Angolan Government bonds to maximize yield, obtaining Central bank approval on cash pooling arrangements in South Africa, or dividends repatriation or understanding the different Dollar rates offered in the Nigerian controlled market, one needs to have consistent and regular discussions with the banking partners and stay abreast of changes in each local market. One needs to also keep the local and global business leaders in the loop of changes and progress to manage expectations as some folks believe that if it can be done in New York, surely it can be executed in Africa as well.


 

Vasu Reddy

Corporate Treasury, Finance Executive