Future-Ready Rails: A Recap of Jiko, iCapital, and Nitor’s Panel Discussion at TMANY’s New York Cash Exchange

Jiko joined treasury leaders at TMANY’s New York Cash Exchange 2026, hosting a panel discussion, Future-Ready Rails: Aligning Rail Choices to Liquidity Strategy for Measurable Outcomes, to explore cash management topics spanning bank connectivity, settlement rails, and allocation decisions. 

The panel featured Ken Cavazzi, Principal at Nitor Partners, Greg Marino, Head of Treasury at iCapital, and Chandler Arney, Institutional Growth & Partnerships at Jiko, as the moderator. 

The discussion centered on a pressing challenge for modern treasury teams: how unifying payment rails, custody, and investment workflows can transform cash management across complex corporate and fund structures, ultimately reducing idle cash and mitigating operational risk.

Key Takeaways

• Fragmented banking architecture and cash visibility challenges can elevate operational risk

• Capital preservation and immediate liquidity are foundational priorities for cash managers

• Elevated idle cash balances can be a symptom of forecasting and visibility challenges, fragmentation of multi-entity structures, and settlement friction

• Unified workflows across banking and investments remove manual handoffs and structurally reduce counterparty exposure.

Establishing a Connected Liquidity Network

The session opened by establishing the requirements for a connected liquidity network: a single source of truth encompassing all banking, custody, and investment accounts. The panel discussed how operating without this unified architecture exposes corporate treasuries to significant real-time visibility gaps, capital inefficiencies, and elevated risk.

When data and settlement systems remain siloed, liquidity risk can rapidly turn into operational risk as treasury teams are left estimating available balances or missing narrow execution windows. 

The speakers used an example of a recent implementation they collaborated on that required configuring distinct user profiles, navigating complex cross-border FX, and engineering payment and scenario planning capabilities across entities. The successful deployment definitively proved that overcoming legacy tech debt and fragmentation is entirely achievable when direct payment rails are seamlessly integrated into core treasury workflows.

Mitigating Operational Friction and Cash Drag

The panel was asked to share their thoughts on the following statistic from Jiko’s 2026 Corporate Cash Confidence Survey Report: Nearly half of treasury and finance respondents indicated that over 10% of their organization’s cash remains uninvested at any given time. 

While each scenario is unique and there is no one-size-fits-all percentage or rule of thumb, carrying excessive uninvested cash represents a substantial opportunity cost. There’s a delicate balance required in managing cash buffers between feeder funds, operating accounts, and investment vehicles. By offering automated investment in T-bills paired with payment rails, Jiko helps treasury teams achieve this balance through a single account. Cash generates the “risk-free” rate of T-bills up until the moment a transaction is initiated, with support for ACH, wires, cards, and even 24/7 settlement with JikoNet. Get in touch with the Jiko team to learn more.

Calibrating Safety, Liquidity, and Yield

The 2026 Corporate Cash Confidence Survey also revealed that the primary considerations for managing cash were 1) access to cash when needed (60%), 2) principal protection and minimizing risk exposure (46%). Generating yield is the lowest consideration, with only 31% of respondents selecting yield as a priority. 

The results were not surprising to the panelists, as they strongly advocated for utilizing high-quality, low-risk instruments and trusted banking partners.

Looking Ahead

When asked about the future of treasury moving towards 24/7 settlement, the speakers advised treasury teams to rigorously evaluate the cost-benefit ratio of real-time transaction settlement versus the traditional model of holding cash overnight or across weekends. 

Reach out to Jiko to discuss your needs and challenges.

*Source: 2026 Corporate Cash Confidence Survey, Jiko