This article was written by HedgeFlows
In the often labyrinthine world of finance and accounting, real-time reconciliations may seem like another industry buzzword. Clumsily thrown around by those keen on the latest bells and whistles for their balance sheets. However, beneath the jargon lies an indispensable foundation for organisations aspiring to safe, agile, and robust financial operations. It’s more than technological fashion. It’s about securing a future for your business that is as dynamic as it is secure.
Picture the mile marker in a marathon race—your reconciliations are exactly that in the financial journey of your business. They mark the progress with precision, and when every second counts, staying updated is not a luxury; it’s a necessity.
Real-time reconciliations hold the key to a financially agile enterprise. This is due to an increasing global market and the advent of digital transactions. For accountants and finance managers, the need for precision is non-negotiable. Traditional methods, like manual data entry or delayed bank feeds, no longer keep pace with the relentless surge of transactions across the world.
Delayed reconciliations are not just a bottleneck for daily operations. They can lead to costly errors and oversights that reverberate across the fiscal calendar. Timely reconciliation means better risk management, more informed decision-making, and, crucially, can unlock hidden capital within your operations.
The risk posed by outdated reconciliation processes is multifaceted and unforgiving. Financial discrepancies, whether in your sales pipeline or supply chain, can have a lasting impact on your standing in the market. A one-time error can lead to prolonged fallout in terms of client trust and investor confidence, which are currencies more valuable than any monetary capitals.
Furthermore, the delay in recognising these discrepancies can lead to erroneous financial statements and misdirected funds, often with expensive trickle-down effects. It’s akin to trying to navigate a dense forest with an outdated map—not impossible, but certainly unwise, and downright costly in terms of efficiency and resources.
The guard changes forever in the world of finance, and technology has heralded a new dawn for reconciliation processes. APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) that enable two-way communication between your financial systems and banking/merchant transaction feeds are empowering businesses to reconcile in real time.
Automation is streamlining the once arduous task of matching volumes of transactions with unprecedented speed and accuracy. Imagine your banking data and your accounting ledger dancing in sync, providing a performance that is not only prompt but pristine.
Case studies are powerful exemplars of the transformative power of real-time reconciliations. Take a look at a travel company client of HedgeFlows, which saw a 60% reduction in errors and an 80% saving in resource hours by switching from manual to live reconciliations. On the other hand, a logistics company, after automating their reconciliation processes, noticed a marked increase in their working capital efficiency and a surge in their liquidity ratios, all due to the transparency and cash visibility in multiple currencies that real-time reconciliation affords.
The stories are compelling—real-time reconciliations are not just a convenience; they’re the lifeline to a financially resilient business model.
For those pioneering the shift towards real-time reconciliations, the results are not just gratifying but can be paradigm-shifting. It’s about harnessing every transaction, every cash flow, as an opportunity to bolster the financial integrity of your enterprise.
Organisations must no longer treat recon activities as just another back-office chore but as a strategic player in their growth trajectory.
The takeaway is clear. In today’s dynamic economic landscape, being diligent and being delayed are as different as success and obscurity. Modern accounting technologies and systems exist not only to automate but also to amplify the competitive edge that real-time financial insights provide.
Real-time reconciliations are not speculative foundations for the future of finance. They’re a current-day imperative for a safe and sustainable financial future. The question is not if you can afford real-time reconciliations. But whether you can afford not to have them as your business grows.
The journey towards real-time reconciliation might seem daunting. But it’s a path paved with reductions in financial risks. Efficiencies that translate to the bottom line, and a compass holstered for strategic decision-making. For accountants and finance managers who seek to drive value and elevate their businesses, the time for real-time reconciliations is now.
Treasury Masterminds is a community of professionals working in treasury management or those interested in learning more about various topics related to treasury management, including cash management, foreign exchange management, and payments. To register and connect with Treasury professionals, click [HERE] or fill out the form below to get more information.
This article is written by Cobase
From the outside, bank connectivity often looks like a solved problem. Connect to banks, move data, initiate payments. In practice, it remains one of the most persistent operational challenges in treasury.
What looks simple on the surface – “just connect to banks globally” – often becomes complicated as soon as organizations operate across countries, currencies, and banking partners. As Robin Wortelboer, Integration Consultant, at Cobase, notes, the core reason is structural: “There is no single connectivity standard that works everywhere, for every bank, and for every use case.”
This is precisely why specialist connectivity providers exist. Achieving reliable, scalable global coverage is not about choosing one technology per se, but about mastering many of them, and knowing when to use which. “A vendor like us exists because full coverage requires understanding all connectivity flavours,” Wortelboer explains. “Most solutions in the market cover only a subset.”
Among those solutions, there is no shortage of developments that appear to lower the barrier to bank connectivity. API aggregators exist, but many are rooted in PSD2, retail banking models, or limited regional coverage. They can be effective within those constraints, but they rarely meet the needs of large, multi-entity organisations operating across jurisdictions.
Neo-banks can help corporates open accounts in markets that are otherwise difficult to access. However, as Wortelboer points out: “They don’t solve enterprise-grade payment orchestration or deep bank integration. They certainly are useful in specific scenarios, however they do not replace the need for robust connectivity into the traditional banking system. From a connectivity perspective they add another party to connect to for corporates.”
Bank APIs themselves are improving. Large banks are expanding API scope beyond basic payment initiation, moving past regulatory pilots towards more functional offerings.
But coverage and maturity still vary significantly by bank, by country, and by product. Technical standards differ, typically the API does not cover all relevant services the bank has to offer, documentation quality is inconsistent, and behavior in live environments is far from uniform.
Global banks offer multi-banking services, but most have been limited in reach and functionality (e.g. these typically rely on Swift MT messaging). This is effective for balance reporting and cash visibility, yet, as Wortelboer puts it, “it has limited transactional scope – useful for visibility, not for full operational control”.
ERPs sometimes provide native multi-bank connectivity, but in practice this almost always requires a specialized implementation partner. Even then, it does not remove the underlying fragmentation. Each bank still behaves differently, and those differences still need to be managed. The result is not a lack of options (quite the opposite), but a lack of complete coverage.
In practice, full global coverage requires a broad and deliberately hybrid connectivity stack.
“APIs should be used where they make sense,” says Wortelboer. Where banks offer mature APIs with sufficient scope, they can provide speed and flexibility. However, the technical variation between banks remains high. “Leveraging existing integrations, experience, and scale materially reduces complexity and implementation risk. Corporates will need to bridge a substantial period of hybrid connectivity supporting legacy and API integrations”.
Host-to-host connectivity remains the backbone of corporate-to-bank interaction for bulk payments. It is widely adopted, technically straightforward, and built on proven operational processes. That combination makes it fast to implement and highly reliable – particularly for high-volume, business-critical payment flows. “For bulk payments, host-to-host is still the workhorse,” Wortelboer notes.
Country-specific standards still matter, and often more than global approaches assume. Electronic Banking Internet Communication Standard (EBICS) in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and France is a prime example. Its structured framework and strong bank adoption enable stable, predictable implementations. In these markets, EBICS often outperforms more generic connectivity approaches precisely because it reflects local banking reality.
Swift remains essential for global reach. Most banks worldwide support some form of Swift connectivity, making it the practical default where APIs or host-to-host connections are unavailable or impractical. As a Swift member, Cobase’s own bank identifier code (BIC) enables clients to connect in markets where they have limited local presence or cannot rely on the footprint of their global banks.
Swift Business Connect, which allows clients to efficiently set up their own SWIFT BIC, supported by a 3rd party, adds another layer for specific use cases. “It’s not for everyone,” Wortelboer explains, “but for clients where owning a BIC makes sense and direct Swift onboarding is too complex, we can act as a Business Connect Provider.” This enables faster onboarding or migration to Swift Alliance Cloud while keeping alternative connectivity options available, so clients can choose the most cost-effective set-up per bank and per country.
Connectivity methods on their own do not solve treasury problems, however. The real challenge is running them as a coherent operating model without the corporate having to build a separate organization for this purpose.
A mature set-up combines direct APIs where available, host-to-host connections for scale and reliability, country standards where they dominate, and Swift where global reach is required. But without orchestration on top, this quickly becomes another form of fragmentation.
There is no single connectivity standard that works everywhere, for every bank, and for every use case.
Robin Wortelboer
Integration Consultant at Cobase
“That orchestration layer is critical,” stresses Wortelboer. It standardizes workflows, data structures, approval structures, security controls, and monitoring across all connectivity types. Treasury teams interact with a single operating environment, even when the underlying connections differ bank by bank and country by country.
This is where Cobase goes beyond pure aggregators or connectivity-only providers. By combining hybrid connectivity with treasury and payment hub capabilities, the platform turns multiple connectivity channels into a single, controlled operating layer.
Among all the connectivity complexities, Wortelboer concludes: “A mature global banking set-up requires a hybrid strategy – direct APIs where possible, host-to-host, EBICS, or Swift where required – plus orchestration on top.”
Connectivity done well is rarely visible, he adds. Instead, it shows up as fewer workarounds, fewer exceptions, and fewer surprises at the end of the day. That is the difference between partial connectivity and connectivity that actually supports how treasury operates.
Recognising Cobase as the winner of TMI’s Best Bank Connectivity Award 2026, acknowledges this reality. Not that bank connectivity can be simplified away – but that, with the right support, it can be handled properly, at scale, and in a way that works in practice.
Treasury Masterminds is a community of professionals working in treasury management and those interested in learning more about topics such as cash management, foreign exchange management, and payments. To register and connect with Treasury professionals, click [HERE] or fill out the form below to get more information.
This article is written by Natixis Investment Managers
In the first wave of the digital finance industry, neobanks and neobrokers won over customers with intuitive apps, low fees and instant account opening. But with the increasing maturity of the market, these advantages are no longer sufficient. Today, the design of the user interface no longer decides how effectively platforms manage and optimize the liquidity of their customers.
Retail investors and young savers now expect one thing above all: that their money never just lies around. They want security, flexibility and competitive returns – even on cash balances. This is where many digital platforms fail. For digital providers, it is more than just a “nice-to-have” to offer significant liquidity solutions. These have become one of the most important levers to keep users with themselves, strengthen their attachment to the platform and stand out in an increasingly crowded market. And this is where asset managers can play an important role.
Cash credit is often underestimated in the fintech world – in the background, it shapes almost every decision that digital customers make: whether it is the opening of an account or how long they park their money, which platform they entrust to their investments or how actively they act or save. If customers receive little or nothing on their unused cash balance, then of course they shift it elsewhere. And this leads to lower activities, high customer churn and ultimately to falling yields.
Platforms that offer intelligent liquidity solutions, on the other hand, experience a very different dynamic. Clients stay longer, a larger share of their assets remain on the platform, and both trading and investment activities tend to increase. These platforms create a user experience that feels completely rather than purely transactional – and thus strengthens the customer relationship and long-term loyalty.
Many neobanks and neobrokers actually already offer attractive returns, which are often increased by promotional interest or short-term incentives. But return is only part of the story – and the part that is easiest to copy. What actually sets one platform apart from others is something else. It’s not about how high the advertised interest rate is, but what the quality and resilience of the underlying liquidity architecture is.
For private customers, liquidity solutions offer something that temporarily high returns cannot: consistency, security and predictability across different market cycles. Temporarily highly advertised interest rates lead to deposits, but do not automatically deepen engagement and do not create trust. Thoughtful liquidity products, on the other hand, deliver both attractive and stable earnings, protect capital and are reliable even in volatile markets. They convey to customers that they can leave their balance in good conscience invested longer, rather than moving it from one promotional offer to the next.
Platforms can benefit from this. Instead of causing a stir with costly interest rate campaigns, they can consolidate customer relationships through sustainable value – driven by a robust liquidity infrastructure rather than marketing budgets.
Digital vendors are not trying to reinvent themselves as asset managers; they want to provide their clients with simple, reliable investment options that they can trust right from the start. For this, they need pragmatic, ready-to-go solutions that can be seamlessly integrated into their existing infrastructure, institutional and easily implementable liquidity management, and products with stable, transparent returns that private customers also understand. Above all, they are looking for strategies that remain robust over different market cycles: solutions that work both at rising and falling interest rates and in all scenarios in between. In short, they are looking for partners who care about the complexity in the background so that they can fully concentrate on the service for their users.
In this environment, working with an asset manager can create attractive returns and institutional stability can be a strategic advantage.
B2B fintech company: The rise of neobanks as a partner for corporate treasuries
In addition, there are further changes in the corporate Treasury sector in particular that could fundamentally change the way companies operate their cash management.
In its latest Annual Global Payments Report 11, the Boston Consulting Group describes its annual report on global payment transactions that these changes are proceeding faster and faster: “Disruptive innovations are changing the structure of payment transactions and reshaping cash flows. Established market participants must adapt their business and operating models fundamentally – and above all quickly.”
There are several drivers for this change – one of which is the downsizing of Treasury departments: companies are forced to do more with fewer resources, and therefore increasingly strive for efficiency. The increased use of AI helps to increase this efficiency, and finally, the rise of neobanks in recent years has forced even the slowest established providers to gain more agility.
As digitally designed platforms, they are usually faster when adopting new technologies – whether for real-time payments or API integration. And hardly anything suggests that they are planning to throttle their pace. In addition, they are increasingly advancing into the area of cash management. There was, for example, a neobank that adopted a digital treasury solution platform and has thus been able to offer its customers extended cash management functions since then – including a uniform investment interface for “untapped liquidity” of SMEs.
The more neobanks and other fintechs scale, the more their treasury functions develop from a supportive to a strategic role. In a low margin environment, every component of the business must make a maximum contribution – and this includes cash management. Whether by optimizing your own processes by making better use of the managed deposits or by a particularly wide range of services for customers: It is certain that they will drive a change across the entire system.
For digital providers, choosing the right liquidity partner is not a mere question of procurement, but a strategic decision. Digital platforms compete in an environment where customer loyalty, brand trust, and user experience determine survival.
In this context, an asset manager with a deep and diversified supply of liquidity solutions is far more than just a product provider. Natixis Investment Managers brings the scale, reliability and expertise that digital providers need to expand their offerings. With liquidity assets of over 50 billion euros 3 managed by our affiliated specialized investment manager Ostrum Asset Management, as well as over four decades of experience across all market cycles, Natixis Investment Managers has made a name for itself as a provider of stable, transparent and resilient cash management solutions.
Our offer goes far beyond traditional money market funds. We cover the full range of liquidity strategies – from ultra-short solutions with daily access to short-term credit strategies that can increase return while preserving liquidity. With the help of a global multi-boutique model with more than 15 specialized affiliates, hundreds of analysts and portfolio managers, as well as a strong presence in Europe, we offer digital platforms easy-to-integrate products, customized solutions, operational simplicity and the security of risk management at the highest level.
In a market that relies on trust and performance, Natixis Investment Managers combines scale with flexibility, helping digital providers strengthen their value proposition, deepen customer loyalty, and create the long-term stability their customers expect.
Even though many neobanks and neobrokers now offer top returns, the real difference is how smart these returns are structured. Private customers do not all behave the same: some hold liquidity for the daily payment transactions, others have larger balances for medium-term goals, and many build up a security cushion before investing. And here it becomes clear how effective cash animaling is. By offering different layers of liquidity – solutions with instant access for daily needs, strategies with a slightly longer duration for a higher return, and short-term credit funds for customers who want additional returns – they can offer each customer segment the right ratio of return and availability. Instead of a single, undifferentiated interest rate, digital providers can create a completely individual user experience that feels tailor-made and transparent. Cash Tiering across different investment horizons not only optimizes the results for customers – it also deepens customer loyalty, encourages higher deposits on the platform and positions liquidity as a well-thought-out, value-creating service rather than a mere promotional interest.
Natixis Investment Managers and Ostrum AM offer a range of liquidity solutions designed for different levels of return and availability. These include:
1. Classic Money Market Fund (MMFs)
Ultra-short strategies that provide daily access and a conservative profile. They are ideal for:
A selection of the MMFs from Ostrum AM ranges from very short-term investment horizons (1 day) to terms of 1-3 months and combines safety, daily availability and ESG integration.
2. Short-running investment strategies
For customers who also like to accept slightly longer investment horizons – usually of a few months – platforms can offer higher returns – and with high liquidity and low volatility. These strategies are used to invest in:
Funds of Ostrum AM with short investment duration include 6- to 12-month loan strategies.
3. Advanced liquidity solutions
These are strategies designed to achieve higher returns while maintaining daily liquidity. You can supplement MMFs by providing:
Ostrum AM’s expanded liquidity solutions include ultra-short credit funds as well as short-running lending strategies for investment horizons between 6 and 24 months.
These solutions help platforms offer staggered liquidity and create premium options for highly active customers.
Money market funds and short-term pension funds are an attractive investment opportunity for short-term liquidity – from daily money or money. Overnight liquidity up to medium- to long-term liquidity with maturities of up to 24 months. The funds invest in a broadly diversified portfolio of high-quality, short-running securities and offer attractive returns in addition to daily liquidity. These funds are regulated and must meet certain criteria. Since they do not have fixed maturities, they can react flexibly to changing capital market conditions.
There are two types of money market funds: short-term money market funds and standard money market funds. The table compares the characteristics of money market and short-term bond funds:
| Short-running MMFs | Standard MMFs | Short-term pension funds | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Maximum term of assets | 397 Tage | 2 Jahre | Keine |
| Maximum average maturity of assets | 120 Tage | 12 Monate | Keine |
| Maximum weighted average runtime (duration) | 60 Tage | 6 Monate | Keine, aber in der Regel 2 Jahre |
| Average rating | AA-A | AA-A | A-BBB |
| Minimum rating | BBB-* | BBB- | Keine |
| Minimum daily liquidity ratio | 7,5 %** | 7,5 % | Keine |
| Minimum weekly liquidity ratio | 15 %*** | 15 % | Keine |
| Recommended holding time | Über Nacht bis zu 1 Monat | 1 | Bis zu 3 Monate >3 Monate (6 bis 24 Monate) |
| Cash / Cash equivalents | Ja | Ja | Nein |
The main risks of liquidity solutions are credit risk, interest rate risk and liquidity risk, with credit risk being the most significant of the three. Credit risk is reduced by high diversification and the focus on high-quality issuers. In the event of systematic market declines, such as those observed in the global financial crisis of 2007 or the outbreak of Covid 2020, standard money market funds, and in particular short-term pension funds, will experience temporary price volatility. Short-term money market funds should remain stable even in extreme market environments.
Money market funds generally have very little interest rate risk, and liquidity risk is kept low by investing only in high-liquid securities. Yet, as with credit risk, liquidity risk for some funds in extreme market environments may increase. Short-term bond funds can take on more credit, interest and liquidity risk than money market funds, which is why investors need to consider the recommended holding periods before investing in any type of fund in the field of liquidity solutions
The next growth chapter for digital platforms is not about flashy user interfaces or marketing campaigns. Instead, it comes down to something simpler and more fundamental – namely, how they help customers make their money work, every day and in any market environment.
Liquidity is becoming a new competitive advantage. And with strong partners and the right products, digital platforms can transform liquidity from a passive function to a strong magnet for customer retention and long-term loyalty.
Treasury Masterminds is a community of professionals working in treasury management or those interested in learning more about various topics related to treasury management, including cash management, foreign exchange management, and payments. To register and connect with Treasury professionals, click the button below.
From Treasury Masterminds
Many treasury teams believe ISO 20022 is largely behind them.
After all, payment files have been migrated, banks have updated their channels, ERP providers have released new formats, and most organisations have survived the initial transition without major disruption.
Unfortunately, November 2026 suggests otherwise.
The next major milestone in the ISO 20022 journey is approaching, and it could have a far bigger operational impact than many treasury teams realise.
Several payments organisations and market infrastructures have identified November 2026 as the next critical milestone in the global ISO 20022 migration.
While much of the attention over the past few years focused on payment initiation and reporting messages, the next phase extends deeper into payment investigations, enquiries and exception handling.
Financial institutions will increasingly be expected to process investigation and enquiry messages using ISO 20022 MX standards rather than legacy formats.
At the same time, structured data requirements continue to expand across the payments ecosystem.
In simple terms, the industry is moving beyond simply sending payments in ISO 20022 format. The focus is now shifting towards how payments are investigated, repaired, tracked and reported when something goes wrong.
And as every treasurer knows, that is often where the real operational challenges begin.
Recent industry surveys paint a mixed picture.
While significant progress has been made, a considerable number of financial institutions remain behind schedule in several key areas:
The challenge is not necessarily sending payments.
The challenge is handling the increasingly rich data that accompanies those payments throughout their lifecycle.
Historically, many payment investigations relied on manual processes, free-text fields and significant human intervention.
ISO 20022 aims to replace much of that ambiguity with structured information.
That is good news for efficiency.
It is less good news for organisations whose systems, processes or data models are not yet prepared.
It is tempting to view ISO 20022 as primarily a banking project.
That would be a mistake.
Corporate treasury sits at the centre of payment operations, liquidity management and bank connectivity. As banks continue their migration efforts, treasury teams will inevitably feel the impact.
Three areas deserve particular attention.
Many treasury projects officially closed their ISO 20022 workstreams months or even years ago.
That does not mean testing can stop.
Banks continue to introduce enhancements, new requirements and additional message types. Treasury teams should maintain regular dialogue with their banking partners and continue validating connectivity between:
The organisations that experience the fewest issues tend to be the ones that treat connectivity as an ongoing process rather than a one-time project.
One of the major promises of ISO 20022 is better transparency throughout the payment lifecycle.
Investigations, recalls, returns and exception handling processes are increasingly dependent on structured information.
When payment data is incomplete, inconsistent or poorly mapped, resolution times can increase significantly.
Treasury teams should therefore pay close attention to:
The quality of payment data is rapidly becoming just as important as the payment itself.
Many organisations completed their ISO 20022 projects based on minimum compliance requirements.
That was often the correct decision at the time.
However, as banks and market infrastructures continue expanding their use of ISO 20022 capabilities, treasury teams should revisit previous assumptions.
Questions worth asking include:
A quick health check today is significantly cheaper than a remediation project next year.
ISO 20022 is often described as a messaging standard.
In reality, it is becoming a data standard.
The long-term value lies not in XML files but in richer, more structured information flowing across the financial ecosystem.
That data will support:
The organisations that treat ISO 20022 purely as a compliance exercise may meet the deadline.
The organisations that treat it as a data transformation opportunity are likely to gain the greatest benefits.
November 2026 may not generate the same headlines as the original migration deadlines, but it represents another important step in the industry’s ISO 20022 journey.
For treasurers, the message is simple.
Don’t assume ISO 20022 is finished.
Keep testing. Keep validating data quality. Keep challenging vendors and banking partners.
Because in payments, the difficult part is rarely sending the payment.
It is dealing with everything that happens after it leaves your account.
Treasury Masterminds is a community of professionals working in treasury management or those interested in learning more about various topics related to treasury management, including cash management, foreign exchange management, and payments. To register and connect with Treasury professionals, click the button below.
