28th April 2022 – The 2022 Corporate Debt and Treasury Report, produced in partnership with Herbert Smith Freehills, has just been released.

Download report

Key conclusions from our 2022 analysis include:

• the positive outlook noted in our 2021 research has receded with a combination of post-pandemic supply chain and energy cost issues as well as inflationary pressures and other factors, directly and indirectly, posing challenges to a number of aspects of corporate treasury. Those challenges though are not expected to curtail the supply of debt but may impact on terms, pricing and the timing of raising debt.
• ESG and sustainability continues to be the topic of treasury conversations and its adoption and evolution will continue for some time, particularly as it percolates through all forms of corporate debt finance.
• over 70% of respondents expect to include ESG or sustainability features in their next financing with the impediments to doing so weakening as ESG and sustainability in debt finance becomes better understood. Sustainability-linked loans and bonds amount to almost half of all Sustainable Finance of respondents.
• significant year on year increases in corporate expenditure are predicted both on investment (capital expenditure and working capital, the latter often driven through supply chain pressures) and distributions to shareholders.
• as expected, treasury appetite to use crypto-currencies is extremely low with significant hurdles to be overcome if it is ever to become a typical feature of corporate treasury. This is a trend we will monitor over the longer term.