Net Impact On Treasury Functions – Survey

Results of the survey, conducted by the Association for Financial Professionals (AFP) and Ernst & Young LLP, show that:

• three-quarters of practitioners believe that the Internet’s biggest impact will be on fostering workflow efficiencies,
• over 80% believe that the Internet will have a major impact on payments, collections and investments,
• over a third consider the Internet to be very important in realizing their company’s goals for centralizing treasury, and
• a further 68% expect the Internet’s role will be extremely important by the year 2003

Getting Involved 

Treasury departments are also becoming more involved in negotiating Internet alliances and making Internet outsourcing decisions, according to the survey.

In fact,

• almost half the respondents said treasury had some involvement in setting their organization’s e-commerce strategy,
• while 38% agreed that treasury was taking on a leadership role in their company’s Internet planning

The study also suggests that the Internet is driving activities forward:

• almost a quarter of respondents thought that e-commerce activities were actually a higher priority now, relative to last year, and
• over a third felt internally focused Web activities were a higher priority now

Methodology 

The survey was sponsored by and sponsored by JPMorgan Treasury Services and conducted in June 2001. It comprised the responses of 977 AFP practitioner members, including corporate treasurers, controllers, CFOs, presidents, assistant treasurers and cash managers.