Why the treasury must be involved from the beginning

Too often, treasury is brought in at the last minute. Not by accident, but by habit.

And that habit doesn’t belong to treasury. It belongs to the organization.

By the time treasury is invited into the conversation, the decision has already been made, the contract already signed, and the market already entered. What follows is predictable: trapped cash, FX surprises, liquidity stress, rushed fixes, and the familiar sentence: “Can treasury help us solve this?”

Yes. But it would have been cheaper to ask earlier.

The recurring pattern

Treasury is rarely absent. It is simply late.

Business teams move fast, and that momentum matters. Growth, expansion, new suppliers, new routes, and new currencies are all reasonable decisions.

Until the excitement fades and the financial implications are left unchecked.

Treasury typically enters the scene when:

• Cash does not move as freely as expected
  
• FX exposure suddenly matters
  
• Liquidity looks tighter than planned
  
• Banking structures no longer scale
  

At that point, Treasury is no longer adding value. It is limiting damage.

This pattern is exactly what our Online Treasury Scan  

 is designed to identify early.

New markets: where cash goes to hide

A new market is announced. The entity is live. Operations are running. Revenue starts flowing. Only then does treasury discover that:

• Cash cannot be repatriated easily
  
• Local regulations were underestimated
  
• Banking is fragmented
  
• Pooling is not allowed or extremely expensive
  

 None of this is surprising.
It just wasn’t discussed early enough.

The right treasury question is simple:
Can cash move in and out, under which rules, at what cost?

This question should be addressed by the Treasury team / Interim Treasury Consultants before the market goes live, not six months later.

New routes and currencies: FX doesn’t care about optimism

Commercial teams agree to invoice in a new currency. Margins look fine on paper. FX risk is treated as a rounding error. Treasury hears about it once:

• Volumes have grown
  
• Exposure has become material
  
• Contracts do not allow repricing
  
• Hedging suddenly feels urgent
  

At that point, treasury is expected to “fix FX”.
FX cannot be fixed retroactively. It can only be managed properly if it is designed into the commercial model.

The right treasury question is again simple:
Who carries the FX risk, and how do we want to manage it?

That decision should never be accidental.

Structures and systems: design choices that age badly

New entities, new systems, new operating models. All implemented with the best intentions. Treasury gets involved when:

• Bank connectivity does not work
  
• Cash visibility is incomplete
  
• Pooling becomes complex or impossible
  
• Manual workarounds start multiplying
  

These issues are rarely caused by treasury design.
They are caused by treasury not being asked to design anything.

The real cost of involving treasury too late

Late treasury involvement always comes with a price:

• Higher funding costs
  
• Reactive hedging instead of structured risk management
  
• Trapped or idle cash
  
• Unnecessary banking complexity
  
• Governance and compliance stress
  

The most painful part is that these costs rarely appear in the original business case. They surface later, quietly, spread across departments, and are accepted as “part of doing business.”

They are not.

What “from the beginning” actually means

Involving treasury early does not mean slowing down the business.
It means avoiding surprises that slow it down later.

Treasury does not need to approve every decision.
Treasury needs to be present when:

• New markets are explored
  
• New currencies are introduced
  
• Commercial models are designed
  
• Structures and systems are selected
  

Early involvement allows treasury to flag risks, design scalable solutions, and align liquidity and FX with strategy. That is not bureaucracy. That is basic risk management.

A simple rule of thumb

If treasury is mainly fixing problems, it is already too late.
If treasury is bored, things are probably going well.

Treasury works best when nothing dramatic happens.
That usually means someone invited them early.

And where Pecunia fits in

At Pecunia, we see this pattern every day. Treasury teams pull in once decisions are locked, timelines are tight, and expectations are high. At that point, treasury can still help, but the leverage is already gone.

Our role is often much earlier in the journey:

• Sense-checking expansion plans from a treasury perspective
  
• Stress-testing FX, liquidity, and cash implications before contracts are signed
  
• Designing scalable structures that still work two or three markets later
  

Sometimes that leads to an interim treasurer stepping in. Sometimes, to a short advisory engagement. Sometimes, just a few uncomfortable questions at the right moment. Treasury adds the most value when it is involved from the beginning.
If that is not happening yet, that is exactly where Pecunia can help. Contact us