What does a corporate treasurer do?
A core Corporate Treasury interview question — asked in analyst and associate interviews across IB, PE, and the Big 4.
THE SHORT ANSWER
Treasury safeguards the firm's liquidity and manages its financial risks. The core remits: cash and liquidity management (forecasting, pooling, ensuring the business can always meet obligations), funding and capital structure (raising and managing debt, banking facilities, maturity/refinancing, rating relationships), financial risk management (hedging FX, interest-rate, and commodity exposures within policy), bank relationship and account management, and intercompany/in-house-bank financing. The rhythm runs from daily (cash positioning, payment approval, hedge execution) to quarterly (covenant compliance, board reporting) to annual (refinancing, budget/funding plan input, policy review). Treasury sits between the business and the capital markets, is heavily controls- and policy-driven (segregation of duties, mandates, counterparty limits), and increasingly is a strategic partner on M&A financing, capital allocation, and balance-sheet decisions — not just a back-office payments function. The unifying objective: the company never runs out of cash and its financial risks stay within appetite at efficient cost.
WHAT INTERVIEWERS LISTEN FOR
- ✓Cash/liquidity, funding/capital structure, financial-risk hedging, bank relationships, IC financing
- ✓Cadence: daily (positioning/payments/hedging) → quarterly (covenants/board) → annual (refinancing/plan)
- ✓Controls/policy-driven; segregation of duties, mandates, limits
- ✓Strategic partner on M&A financing/capital allocation, not just payments
COMMON MISTAKES
- ✗Describing treasury as only payments/back office
- ✗Omitting risk management or funding
- ✗No mention of controls/policy
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