On 20th & 21st May members, friends, partners and sponsors of the ACT met at Celtic Manor in Newport, Wales for the 22nd ACT Annual Conference. It’s been a memorable couple of days, with 1,200 delegates attending, 85 organisations represented in the exhibition hall, and a comprehensive conference programme covering funding, investment, resourcing & talent, sustainable finance and technology.
The volatility and challenges of the first few months of this year created a backdrop of both the complexity of treasury management in these circumstances, and the opportunity it has provided to demonstrate the value of expert treasury professionals to boardrooms across the corporate world.
Lord Kim Darroch opened the conference, sharing his insights from 40 years of diplomatic experience on the current geopolitical situation, and the short and medium-term outlook for trade and tariffs. His personal experiences of meetings with Trump and Putin also provided some unique perspectives.
Dominic Holland, Director of Market Oversight at the Financial Conduct Authority, spoke about the FCA’s current priorities, especially those which will impact on treasurers. His long experience as a market practitioner – together with what he has learned since joining the regulator – illustrated well the interrelationship between policy & regulation, markets and corporates.
From there we moved into a wide choice of strategic and technical treasury sessions, all strongly attended and punctuated with busy, buzzing networking breaks.
We launched our new Affiliate membership category, encouraging anyone who values what the ACT does but who – for whatever reason – is not at a point to take our qualifications to become a part of the Association; and introduced our first microcredentialised qualification (the Certificate in Treasury), as well as treasury apprenticeships which will be available from early 2026. We also held our first every Members’ Town Hall meeting – where members had so many positive questions we rather over-ran our allotted timeslot!
Perhaps the biggest highlight of the two days was the networking evening, with an ACT-takeover of the Celtic Manor Hotel and a relaxed evening of food, drink, music and entertainment stretching from the hotel bars out across the lawns and grounds of the resort. The sun shone, the drinks flowed and the summer party atmosphere was undeniable.
It’s been a full couple of days and I definitely lost count of how many conversations I’ve had, hands I’ve shaken and coffees I’ve consumed. But it’s also been inspiring and energising to see the ACT community and membership come together to learn and to network. I am already really looking forward to next year’s conference in Liverpool (12th & 13th May 2026) – but for now it’s “diolch Cymru”.
