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Brexit – the impact on your business
| 02-05-2018 | Lionel Pavey |
As the negotiations between the EU and the UK get ever more complicated, there is a strong possibility that rather than a hard or soft Brexit there will be no agreement whatsoever. For businesses that either export to the UK or import from, this could have a fundamental impact on their survival. The Netherlands exports goods and services to the UK with a value in excess of EUR 40 billion per year; more than 200,000 jobs are directly linked with trade to the UK; Dutch capital investment in the UK is more than EUR 180 billion. We take a look at some of the key areas where business could be affected from the viewpoint of cashflows.
Foreign Exchange
It is not known how many Dutch companies actively employ a hedging policy. If GBP was to significantly get weaker, demand in the UK might fall or lead to more contracts having to be settled in GBP. However, at the same time, Dutch companies relying on components from the UK could see their suppliers having their profit margins squeezed – potentially leading to problems in maintaining and fulfilling existing contractual obligations. The biggest concern would involve increased currency volatility. If EUR/GBP does become more volatile, this could lead to clients in the UK shopping further afield to obtain the goods and services they require – leading to a drop in exports for the Netherlands. What are the alternatives available – banking in the UK; offsetting existing supply chains by changing components with UK firms etc?
Funding
At present, the UK receives EU funding and this can be the basis for investment decisions regardless of the location of the business. As this will stop when they leave, there will be an impact on companies that have a multiple presence in both countries. Changes in regulations will bring extra complexity, restrictions and possibly affect the profitability of existing business arrangements. The immediate loss of passporting rights for financial services should not be underestimated.
Supply Chain
All existing supply chains operate under the premise of the single market, with no internal quotas or tariffs. The initial affect will be seen by the imposition of trade barriers, caused by a new trade agreement. This does not just extend to trade tariffs, but also to the implementation of VAT (BTW) on B2B transactions. The dairy industry is one that could be hit especially hard. EU tariffs for non-EU countries are as high as 45 per cent on some dairy products.
Non trade barriers are also a threat – different technical standards, labelling, compliance, together with extended delays in the shipment process (as goods will need to be inspected) will add to both the cost and time of trade.
KYC
All parties will be affected – but do you know what the position is of your clients in the UK? What are their pain thresholds; are they seeking alternatives markets; are they looking for alternative suppliers; how resilient are their logistical chains to change; how will changes in law and regulations affect their operations?
There are a myriad of unanswered questions that need to be addressed – one on one – with every counterparty.
What to do
It is imperative that companies perform a Quick Scan as soon as possible to try and evaluate what their exposure is in the UK and what percentage that makes of all trade for a company. Having ascertained the exposure, it then becomes necessary to stress test the processes and try to model the results on the company by inputting new variables.
With less than 1 year to go, you will need to start very soon!!
Lionel Pavey
Cash Management and Treasury Specialist
Make room for the treasury controller!
| 01-05-2018 | Pieter de Kiewit |
Over the last few years, many corporates have been quite frugal in their investments, also in treasury. Times were hard. Now funds are getting available, there is willingness to hire, also treasury controllers. The rising investments in treasury IT, also related to aforementioned funds, often leads to less work for the back office and possibly also the front office. Platforms like 360T or FXAll are examples, but also algo trading. Choosing the system and taking care of what it should do and what it actually does, is often one of many tasks of the treasury controller.
The chaos in the financial markets made regulators increase the number of rules that banks and also corporates have to follow. Furthermore companies expanding globally, and funding their subsidiaries have to following strict internal and external (fiscal and banking) rules. Implementing this framework and being compliant can also be an important task of a treasury controller.
F&A and corporate treasury have been quite well at co-existing in separate worlds and not bothering each other. F&A wants to be in control and appreciates predictability. Treasury is motivated by the dynamics of the markets and adrenaline. But companies integrate functionalities and the treasury controller will build the bridge.
Now why is the search quite hard? First of all because of the drivers mentioned in the last paragraph: the treasurer does not like too much predictability and the controller does not (want to) understand the financial markets. And having thorough knowledge of several functionalities: bookkeeping, IT, regulatory and risk management and make them work well together is not easy. Finally not many corporate treasuries are big enough for a qualified treasury controller. This leads to well paid Big4 auditors and bank controllers. And us having search assignments. Any thoughts and are you interested?
We would like to hear from you,
Pieter, Heleen and Kim
Pieter de Kiewit
[email protected] / +31 6 1111 9783
Pieter de Kiewit
Owner Treasurer Search
Hyperledger blockchain projects: from incubation to production-ready status
| 26-04-2018 | Carlo de Meijer |
Many blockchain followers know the Hyperledger Fabric Framework. This is the most used one in the various trials worldwide. But in the meantime the Hyperledger community has developed a whole series of these projects and tools that are less familiar. The purpose of this blog is to get more insight into these offerings and how they are developing from the incubation to the real production-ready status.
But first of all a reminder!
The Hyperledger Project
The Hyperledger project that was launched end 2015, is the international blockchain consortium of companies and organizations hosted by the Linux Foundation. Their goal is to collectively build an open source platform for the development of blockchains. Hyperledger thereby aims to enable organizations to build robust, industry-specific applications, platforms and hardware systems to support their individual business transactions by creating enterprise grade, open source distributed ledger frameworks and code bases.
The project has attracted the attention of several large companies that were early adopters of distributed ledger technologies at that time. The consortium nearly doubled in size last year to reach almost 200 members. Today, more than 220 organizations now support the Hyperledger initiative, including leading companies in finance, banking, Internet of Things, supply chains, manufacturing and technology development.
Pros of the Hyperledger project
The Hyperledger project has a number of pros that distinct them from other blockchain consortia. First of all Hyperledger is open-source, offering a “neutral home” for incubating technology. They are developing codes as open-source and bringing enterprises together to share knowledge and experience. This may lead to much faster adoption and better solutions than if it is simply built in-house. Second, Hyperledger is not focusing on one area of appliance, but on universal use cases. The software developed at Hyperledger has been adopted in many industries including supply chain, healthcare, finance etc. But what is more important, the Hyperledger Fabric, one of the (considered) most mature, extensive, flexible and active developed frameworks, allows users to create private channels in public settings, enabling the security and privacy that is needed.
Umbrella strategy
Hyperledger operates under an “umbrella” strategy. It is set up as a specialized hub for blockchain projects that facilitates not only the development, but also the commercialization of enterprise-grade blockchain based projects. Hyperledger “incubates” and promotes blockchain technologies for business, including distributed ledgers, client libraries, graphical interfaces and smart contract engines.
This strategy nowadays encompasses a (growing) number of blockchain projects, including blockchain frameworks, in addition to a number of development tools. At the moment Hyperledger incubates nine business blockchain and distributed ledger technologies, of which five blockchain frameworks and three development tools. These are in various stages of development and cover unique blockchain applications.
Read the full article of our expert Carlo de Meijer on LinkedIn
Carlo de Meijer
Economist and researcher