$30 million revenue increase assisted by modern technology

City of Chicago

The City Treasurer of Chicago was established in 1837 and now has over $9 billion in assets under management. The Treasurer’s office is a revenue generating department in the city, bringing in over $150 million yearly. Its internally managed, broadly progressive, and diversified portfolio includes fixed-income securities, alternative investments such as mortgage-backed securities, and more.

• Headquarters Chicago, Illinois
• Assets Under Management $9B
• Website https//www.chicago.gov/city/en.html

The Treasurer’s office needed to cut down the time spent closing their books, drastically reduce the number of manual activities their team conducted and find a solution that would facilitate audit compliance while increasing revenue. Clearwater’s automated data aggregation and reconciliation process made it possible for the Treasurer’s office to add alternative assets to their portfolio and helped the office increase their revenue by $30 million.

• $9 billion in AUM
• $30 million revenue increase assisted by Clearwater
• $20 billion in annual transactions

Challenges

• Reporting errors and reconciliation were hard to manage on over $20 billion in annual transactions.
• Using legacy software and Excel spreadsheets resulted in 12 or more touchpoints for every security held in the portfolio
• Outdated systems prevented them from being a growth enabler for Chicago

Results

• $30 million revenue increase assisted by Clearwater’s data aggregation and reconciliation process
• Reduced manual tasks and improved reporting accuracy
• Enabled the addition of alternative assets to the portfolio

“Clearwater’s platform is a no-brainer. The platform facilitated the addition of $30 million in revenue in one year.”

Craig Slack, Chief Investment Officer, City of Chicago