Stating the obvious?

You wouldn’t trust your key legal decisions to someone who isn’t a qualified lawyer, so whatever the size of your organisation – why entrust your treasury, risk and corporate finance to someone who isn’t a qualified treasury professional? Insist on ACT qualifications.

Most of you reading this statement will be members of the ACT so I hope you will endorse it and work within your own organisation to promote the rigour of professional qualifications for your profession.

The ACT has, over the past 30 years, developed its qualifications and the treasury management profession - but there is more for us to do! In a recent survey carried out prior to an ACT regional group meeting 57% of respondents stated that their employer did not require treasury team members to pass relevant ACT exams as part of their career development.

The facts, however, are that the larger companies and organisations have invested in dedicated and often well qualified teams to manage financial risks in their organisations – 89% of FTSE 100 companies employ ACT members, this falls to 60% in the FTSE 250.

In the early days the ACT was set up to support and promote career treasurers - this implied those working for larger companies. We provide a full suite of qualifications for those wanting to make a career within treasury management. More broadly, the ACT aims to promote treasury knowledge and to this end our qualifications have now been broken down into modules so that a finance professional can secure the treasury expertise he/she needs before moving into a more general financial management role.

The ACT and CIPFA have just launched a joint treasury management qualification CertITM–PF. Through this joint qualification we should be able to extend treasury management knowledge throughout the public sector – not only local authorities but to housing associations and other public entities. This joint qualification comes at a time when it is increasingly recognised that all organisations, whether large or small, need to have appropriate treasury management skills.

Organisations of all sizes come up against financial risk in their day to day lives. Where they cannot justify a dedicated treasury professional the organisation needs to find the skills within – perhaps its CFO or perhaps it relies on external advice. We have seen from the Audit Commission’s report "English local authorities and the Icelandic banks" the best authorities “have well trained staff and engaged elected members”. The reference to “elected members” refers to the non-executive directors or independent directors – those who are charged with challenging the executive.
We do not expect NEDs/independent directors to rush forward to sit our exams but we can ensure that they are suitably equipped to challenge their company's financial risk management.

As members of the ACT we need your ongoing commitment to promote the rigours of professional qualifications.

Efforts to counter the financial crisis

The Bank of England has proposed an extension of the scope of its asset purchase facility to include supply chain funding – the ACT welcomes these proposals and encourages the larger publicly rated companies to work with the banks to structure funding vehicles that are simple and straight forward for their smaller creditor companies to access any implemented facility – this should be a win / win situation.

ACT Events

We have held our first training courses in Dubai in the last month. These were well supported and provide further evidence of interest in the ACT and its qualifications in the region. To celebrate our first year of ACT Middle East, the ACT will be recognising the accomplishments of treasury and finance professionals in the region through two treasury awards:

• Corporate Treasury Deal of the Year
• Treasury Team of the Year

To find out more about the awards and to nominate visit
www.treasurers.org/actmiddleeast/awards

Winners will be announced at the ACT Middle East Gala Dinner taking place on 28 October 2009 in Dubai. Please email actme@treasurers.org for further details.

Global Cash Management Survey 2009

You can take part in the eleventh ACT/J. P. Morgan Global Cash Management Survey online from 6 July at www.treasurers.org/gcmsurvey

This annual survey is the benchmark for the identification of ongoing cash management trends. This year's findings will provide valuable insight into how treasurers are responding to the global recession and if last year's theme of rising risk aversion has continued.

Survey participants will be given the opportunity to receive an advance copy of the findings as well as a customised report showing results versus industry peer groups.

You can also view the 2008 survey results here.

Stuart Siddall

July 2009.

By Stuart Siddall