Executive Interview: Hazeltree Chief Client Officer on Turning Treasury into a Performance Engine

For decades, treasury functions within hedge funds and private markets firms were viewed primarily as operational necessities—focused on controls, cash movements, and risk mitigation. Today, that mindset is shifting. As margins tighten and performance scrutiny increases, leading firms are rethinking treasury as a strategic lever for incremental return, capital efficiency, and operational resilience.

We sat down with Kyri Yiannakis, Chief Client Officer at Hazeltree, to discuss how best-in-class firms are transforming treasury into a source of measurable value—and how purpose-built technology is making that evolution possible.

Q: Treasury has historically been viewed as a cost center or control function. What are you seeing among leading hedge funds and private markets firms that are now using treasury as a deliberate source of incremental return—and how does Hazeltree enable that shift?

Kyri Yiannakis: It really comes down to a few core factors. Historically, treasury was overlooked largely because of prolonged low interest rates and a lack of dedicated technology. Those two dynamics reinforced each other—fund managers and technology providers alike saw little incentive to invest.

Hazeltree took a different view early on. Our vision has always been that treasury holds inherent value, regardless of the rate environment—though higher rates have certainly made the use case more visible. Another major factor has been education and awareness. Many firms simply haven’t fully understood what’s possible when modern technology replaces Excel and manual processes.

There’s shared responsibility here. Fund managers need to invest time in understanding the opportunity, and technology providers must articulate value clearly and concretely. Since most firms we work with are implementing treasury technology for the first time, it’s on us to bring those outcomes to life.

Today, leading firms see treasury as a performance lever—optimizing cash, collateral, debt facilities, and financing decisions. Hazeltree’s singular focus on alternatives makes us the standout choice for hedge funds and private markets managers looking to unlock that value.

Q: Cash drag is one of the most persistent and under-discussed headwinds to fund performance. How does Hazeltree help firms identify trapped or idle cash and systematically convert it into yield without increasing operational risk?

Kyri Yiannakis: Cash drag quietly but materially erodes performance, and the complexity involved makes it nearly impossible to address without technology. It’s often deprioritized due to competing initiatives, limited oversight, or a genuine knowledge gap—but it impacts nearly everyone involved.

Fund managers underperform relative to their potential, and investors don’t realize the returns they should. Hazeltree’s core engine identifies idle or trapped cash across entities and surfaces those insights through intuitive dashboards, along with recommended actions.

We also enable systematic deployment into short-term yield instruments, fully integrated into risk and compliance workflows. The outcome clients care about is simple: incremental basis points, delivered without adding operational complexity.

Q: In today’s environment, even a handful of basis points can materially impact net returns. Where are you seeing Hazeltree’s Securities Finance, Collateral Manager, and Margin Replication capabilities consistently add measurable value for clients?

Kyri Yiannakis: In Securities Finance, we’ve built the leading proprietary content set in the market. The depth and quality of the data we provide enables clients to optimize lending decisions and reduce financing costs in ways others simply can’t. Quite frankly, no one else does this at the level we do, and we’re extremely proud of that capability.

Our Collateral Manager addresses the complexity of collateral allocation by ensuring accuracy and efficiency, freeing up liquidity that would otherwise be misallocated. Without that visibility, firms often have usable collateral sitting idle or incorrectly deployed.

Margin Replication is one of the most frequently requested capabilities we hear about, which is why we invested in developing a truly market-leading solution. The level of detail and analysis we provide is a game changer. Across these capabilities, clients see measurable improvements in capital efficiency and net returns.

Q: Many treasury teams still rely heavily on Excel to manage highly complex cash, collateral, and financing workflows. What risks and missed opportunities does that create—and how does purpose-built treasury technology change the economics of the treasury function?

Kyri Yiannakis: This reliance usually stems from familiarity, perceived zero cost, and a lack of awareness that better options exist. Excel is a powerful tool—but it was never designed to handle client-specific workflows, robust controls, or up-to-date treasury intelligence.

I can share a real example: a firm managing treasury in Excel sent a seven-figure payment to a fraudulent account. That single incident instantly erased any perceived cost savings. With Hazeltree in place, that simply wouldn’t have happened.

Beyond extreme risk scenarios, Excel creates countless missed opportunities to optimize cash, collateral, and financing. Hazeltree turns those areas into performance-enhancing levers by automating complexity, reducing risk, and delivering actionable intelligence. Clients spend less time analyzing data and more time realizing results—and that’s how treasury shifts from cost center to profit driver.

Q: As firms scale across strategies, entities, and geographies, how important is centralized, up-to-date treasury intelligence to improving firm-wide and portfolio-level performance—and what does best-in-class execution look like today?

Kyri Yiannakis: Scaling introduces complexity quickly, and if it’s left unchecked, the risks become harder to detect and address. Fragmented treasury processes and data sources create inefficiencies and elevate risk.

A centralized, up-to-date view enables better liquidity planning, cost optimization, and performance tracking across the organization. Best-in-class firms integrate workflows globally, rely on data-driven insights, and automate treasury operations end-to-end. That combination is what ultimately drives stronger returns and operational resilience.

Conclusion: Treasury as a Strategic Advantage

As hedge funds and private markets firms face increasing pressure to do more with less, treasury is emerging as an untapped source of competitive advantage. With the right technology in place, what was once a back-office necessity becomes a forward-looking engine for yield, efficiency, and risk management.

Hazeltree’s purpose-built treasury platform enables firms to unlock incremental basis points, improve capital efficiency, and operate with confidence at scale—transforming treasury from a cost center into a strategic asset.

Learn more about how Hazeltree helps leading alternatives firms turn treasury into a performance engine. Request a demo.