Opening the final day of Money 20/20 Europe was a session exploring whether treasury management is broken.
Melissa Donohoe, VP of Notion Capital, moderated the panel featuring Pac O’Shea, CEO and co-founder of Round Treasury, and Seth Phillips, founder and CEO of Bound.
O’Shea shared his reasons for entering this space, stating, “We started a couple of months before SVB crashed and what we saw was a concentration risk on the money side. Founders have to sacrifice liquidity for yield with traditional banking products, as well as user experience for trusts.”
Phillips, drawing from his experience in software development for the gold market, recognized the potential to “automate a lot of best practice.”
Regarding the growing interest in treasury management, Phillips noted, “Venture-backed companies often have $10, $50, or $100 million in the bank, and with interest rates no longer at zero, where they keep that money is crucial.”
O’Shea added, “People are now looking at Treasury and innovating in that space. Founders and entrepreneurs are identifying new opportunities there. On the VC side, the hype is due to it representing net new money for businesses that they weren’t considering before.”
Both O’Shea and Phillips emphasized the importance of “being responsible with your cash and the value passing in and out of the business.” O’Shea remarked, “That wasn’t very cool a few years ago, but now people are recognizing there’s real money to be made or saved through effective financial management.”