Lesson 1 · Foundations · Both · 20 min
Treasury Basics for Product Teams
What treasury does—liquidity, funding, risk, and why product launches live or die on cash and settlement design.
Objectives
- ▸Explain treasury’s mandate in banks vs corporates vs fintechs
- ▸Connect product cash flows to liquidity and settlement risk
- ▸Name core treasury artefacts PMs touch (limits, cut-offs, nostro funding)
- ▸Ask the right questions before shipping cross-border features
Treasury ensures the institution can meet obligations when due, funds growth, and manages market risks (interest rate, FX, liquidity). In fintechs, ‘treasury’ may be a small team plus a banking partner—but the economic questions remain.
- Liquidity: cash and high-quality liquid assets to meet outflows.
- Funding: deposits, wholesale, equity, partner bank floats.
- Market risk: FX and rates exposure from customer and proprietary positions.
- Operations: cut-offs, nostro funding, failed settlement handling.
Key terms
LiquidityFundingCut-offPosition limitSettlement risk