New research shows a direct link between non-cash payments and economic growth. With greater consistency coming to how such payments are handled worldwide, Simon Newstead says businesses should be ready to take advantage.

While European Union proposals to limit the time corporates have to make payments in commercial transactions will bring relief to some suppliers, many buyers will face higher debt and lower liquidity. Supply chain finance could be a practical and effective solution to managing working capital efficiently under the EU payments directive, says RBS’s Ugur Bitiren.

New rules changing the amount of capital banks must hold to transact derivatives are likely to affect pension funds in Europe. The good news is the effect is likely to be limited if funds work with their bank counterparties to optimise their positions say Sinead Leahy and Sian Hurrell.

A holistic approach to supply chain financing provides advantages and reduces inefficiencies for both buyers and suppliers.

The range of risks facing corporate treasurers in the period since the financial crisis began has not changed. However, the relative importance of those risks – such as liquidity risk, counterparty risk, interest rate risk and foreign exchange risk – has inevitably altered. And the overall importance of risk management to the future stability of corporates has never been greater than it is now.

With the focus on managing risks, keeping costs down and ensuring transparency, treasurers are reviewing their payment factory plans, aided by new developments in standardisation.

Corporates want connectivity standards that will work with any bank, enabling them to move their cash flows from one institution to another quickly and easily.

Europe’s debt crisis has created some unlikely bedfellows. At the G20 summit in June, non-European countries rich and poor, East and West, spoke with rare unity in rebuking their European counterparts: Your crisis, they said, is dragging us down.

Ever since China leapfrogged Japan to become the world’s second biggest economy last year, demand to trade its currency, the renminbi, have risen to a clamour. Sooner or later, Beijing will heed those calls and allow the separate domestic and international units of the renminbi (RMB) to converge. The effect will be startling.

The private placement market can provide tailored financing for corporates who are unwilling to lock into single tranche bonds or are facing difficulty obtaining bank funding.