Digital developments open up the treasury function

When the corporate treasury community meets at KPMG's Frankfurt offices, it can only mean one thing: The next Digital Treasury Summit is taking place!

Over 100 participants filled the large conference area at Frankfurt Airport on 8 November. "Coming together to network with peers, think outside the box and return home with new ideas and a variety of impressions is what we offer our guests with this event, which has become a firm fixture in the calendars of many treasurers," explains Nils Bothe, Partner in Finance & Treasury Management and Head of Corporate Treasury Advisory.

In addition, 10 exhibitors once again set up their stands and informed interested parties about the latest software developments for treasury.

Source: KPMG AG

As every year, the presentations on this entertaining day addressed new developments in treasury management. The possibilities of digitalisation continue to advance and the use of artificial intelligence opens up new perspectives that need to be explored and evaluated.

Gherri D'Innocenzo, Head of Cash Management Payments, Standards & Projects at Siemens, gave an exciting insight into what the path to real-time treasury using banking APIs can look like and what challenges can be expected. Immediately afterwards, Dr Gerd Berghold, Head of Treasury Operations and Digital Treasury at Deutsche Bahn, gave a varied presentation on the current possibilities of digitalisation, describing various use cases in a lively manner. After the coffee break, Dr David Saive, Special Advisor International Trade, Finance & Digitalisation of the German National Committee of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC Germany e.V.), outlined the status of digitalisation in international trade and trade finance.

This was followed by 3 breakout sessions, each with 2 parallel presentations. In the first session, Julia Schlosser and Lasse Becker from SAP explained the functionality and advantages of an in-house bank and payment factory. At the same time, Dr Stefan Gröger and Julius Pfahl from Prof. Schumann GmbH gave insights into the use of AI to predict business behaviour in payment transactions.

Source: KPMG AG

After the lunch break, Karel Cup from ION presented typical challenges of treasury analytics solutions in the environment of treasury management systems. Using specific examples such as a centralised payment process or automated FX hedging, he illustrated the different requirements in operational and management reporting and the special features resulting from implementation directly in the TMS or alternatively in a data lake / enterprise data warehouse approach. At the same time, a new format was launched: the "Digital Euro" roundtable offered interested participants the opportunity to discuss with KPMG expert Anne-Sophie Gógl after a short keynote speech. This led to an intensive dialogue that continued into the subsequent coffee break.

Dr Dirk Bondzio, risk management expert and part of KPMG's Finance & Treasury Management team, took over the presentation in the last breakout session at short notice following the cancellation of the original speaker due to illness. He presented the results of the "Resilient Treasury" survey conducted by KPMG and then explained the most important prerequisites for a crisis-proof and resilient treasury, particularly in the areas of risk management and liquidity planning. At the same time, the roundtable "AI in Finance and Treasury" with KPMG partner and AI expert Andreas Fachinger once again provided the opportunity for intensive dialogue, which was again actively used.

The crowning finale was the keynote speech by Prof Dr Christian Debus, who took an entertaining look back at 30 years of treasury, not without drawing lessons for the future.

So there was plenty to talk about afterwards over coffee and cake. "We are delighted with the positive feedback on the event and the pleasant, informal atmosphere at our company," reports Börries Többens, Partner, Finance & Treasury Management. "We would like to thank you for this and cordially invite all interested parties to the 10th Digital Treasury Summit in autumn 2025!"

Source: KPMG Corporate Treasury News, issue 149, November 2024

Authors:

Ralph Schilling, CFA, Partner, Head of Finance and Treasury Management, Treasury Accounting & Commodity Trading, KPMG AG

Nils Bothe, Partner, Finance and Treasury Management, Corporate Treasury Advisory, KPMG AG

Börries Többens, Partner, Finance and Treasury Management, Corporate Treasury Advisory, KPMG AG

 From left: Lasse Becker, SAP, Andreas Fachinger, KPMG, Dirk Bondzio, KPMG, Julius Pfahl, Prof. Schumann GmbH, Prof. Dr Christian Debus, VDT, Gherri D'Innocenzo, Siemens, Dr Gerd Berghold, Deutsche Bahn, Karel Cup, ION, Nils Bothe, KPMG, not pictured: Julia Schlosser, SAP, Dr Stefan Gröger, Prof. Schu-mann GmbH, Dr David Cup, ION, Nils Bothe, KPMG. Gerd Berghold, Deutsche Bahn, Karel Cup, ION, Nils Bothe, KPMG, not pictured: Julia Schlosser, SAP, Dr Stefan Gröger, Prof. Schu-mann GmbH, Dr David Saive, ICC Germany, Anne-Sopie Gógl, KPMG and Börries Többens, KPMG