Teresa Cameron is Group CEO of Clear Junction, where she leads the company’s next phase of international growth across payments infrastructure and digital asset capabilities. Teresa brings more than 25 years of experience across trading, foreign exchange, treasury and financial operations, and previously served as Clear Junction’s Group CFO.

Before joining Clear Junction, she held senior roles across financial services and technology, including leadership positions at PRS for Music and UNiDAYS. Teresa has played a central role in shaping Clear Junction’s strategy, strengthening governance and expanding its international footprint. She is a regular voice on cross-border payments, hybrid fiat and onChain infrastructure, stablecoin adoption, safeguarding and treasury operations.

Your career spans more than 25 years across trading, foreign exchange, treasury and financial operations, including senior roles at PRS for Music and UNiDAYS before you joined Clear Junction. How did working across both financial services and technology shape the way you think about payments infrastructure? 

“I’ve seen money movement from several different angles and industries and throughout my career have seen some historically significant changes such as the switch from open outcry to online trading, the introduction of the EUR and more recently the introduction of Digital ledger technology and stablecoin adoption. Trading teaches you very quickly that timing and liquidity matter.

“Foreign Exchange exposes risk management around timing and volatility and managing margin. Finance and Treasury teach you to understand where the money actually is, when settlement is final, whether you can reconcile what has happened and provide sufficiently for what’s about to come next.

“Technology is the layer that helps you to manage and monitor all of these variables and keeping abreast of updates and latest technology gives a competitive advantage. As a recent example, digital ledger technology and stablecoins are driving innovative ways for corporate treasurers to deal with some of the headaches of fiat by opening up out of hours settlement windows. 

“That combination has shaped how I think about payments infrastructure today. I tend to start with the underlying commercial and operational problem. When does the payment need to arrive? How much liquidity does the institution need to hold? What happens if a route becomes unavailable? What evidence and controls need to exist around the transaction and how do we identify and manage the risks? The payment itself may take seconds. The infrastructure behind it has to manage liquidity, settlement, risk, data and reconciliation continuously. That is where much of the real complexity sits.” 

You moved into the role of Group CEO after serving as Group CFO. How does that finance background inform the strategic decisions you now make for a payments and digital asset infrastructure business? 

“Being a CFO gives you a very particular way of looking at decisions. I still instinctively ask where the money sits, what exposure we are taking, how much capital is required, what the operational dependencies are and how we will know whether something is working. That discipline is very useful in a business like ours because payments infrastructure sits at the intersection of technology, finance and risk.

“A new capability can look exciting technically, while the wider decision also needs to consider whether there is a genuine client need, whether the economics work at scale and whether the operating model can support it properly. It also means I care a great deal about evidence. When we make an investment or enter a new market, I want to understand the commercial opportunity alongside liquidity, operational resilience and controls.

“As CEO, my perspective has widened and decisions need to be balanced across a number of areas that balance risk vs opportunity. Having said that, keeping that CFO discipline remains valuable. Sustainable growth comes from making good decisions repeatedly and understanding the consequences behind them.”

Since 2016, the company has built a platform that gives licensed financial institutions payment accounts, virtual IBANs, access to payment networks, and treasury and digital asset services. What does the next phase of international growth look like from where you sit? 

“For us, the next phase is about focused, sustainable growth. We want to deepen our presence in markets where our infrastructure can solve meaningful problems for financial institutions, while continuing to broaden the capabilities available to existing clients. We already operate across traditional payment infrastructure, treasury services and digital assets, and we see significant value in connecting those capabilities more closely. 

“Interoperability is becoming increasingly important. Financial institutions are operating across domestic payment schemes, correspondent networks, instant payment systems and digital asset infrastructure. They need infrastructure that can help them work across those environments while maintaining consistent controls. 

“There is also a strong relationship between international expansion and resilience. Access to several appropriate payment and settlement routes can give institutions greater flexibility as operating conditions, counterparty access and settlement availability change. 

“We are a bootstrapped business, which gives us the ability to take a long-term view. Growth has to strengthen the business and create genuine value for our clients”

Payments are often judged on speed at the front end, though the real advantage sits in how settlement and pre-funding are handled underneath. What does getting that right unlock for a financial institution? 

“Speed is very visible to the customer. Settlement and liquidity are where a large part of the economics sit. If an institution has to pre-fund several accounts across different currencies, counterparties or markets, significant amounts of capital can end up sitting in the system waiting to be used.

“Settlement delays also create uncertainty. Treasury teams need to know what has settled, what is still in flight and what liquidity they genuinely have available. Improving settlement timing can reduce liquidity tied up in pre-funding and the buffers held to absorb timing gaps, while giving the treasury team a clearer view of available cash. 

“There is an operational benefit as well. The longer a transaction remains unresolved, the greater the potential for reconciliation work, investigation and manual intervention. So when we talk about improving payments, I think we should look at the full lifecycle of the transaction: how efficiently and predictably value moves from one party to another, when settlement becomes final and when those funds become available for use again.”

Treasury and liquidity decisions are increasingly shaping which infrastructure a financial institution chooses. How should a leadership team weigh those considerations when they are designing their payment capability? 

“I would start by mapping the flows very clearly. Where does liquidity need to sit? Which currencies are involved? When do payments need to settle? How much capital needs to be pre-funded? What happens outside of traditional banking hours? Which counterparties and providers sit within the chain? And what happens if the preferred route becomes unavailable? Those questions quickly show that infrastructure choices have a direct balance-sheet and operational impact. 

“Leadership teams should also look closely at concentration. Heavy reliance on a single route, counterparty or settlement mechanism can create dependencies that become significant when conditions change. Appropriate alternatives can improve resilience, provided the same level of governance and control can be maintained across them. 

“Data is equally important. Treasury needs a reliable view of balances, transactions, fees, FX and settlement status. Infrastructure has to support both efficient movement of funds and a clear financial picture.  The best architecture gives treasury visibility, control and flexibility alongside efficient movement of funds.”

Institutions can now route payments through domestic schemes, correspondent banking, instant payments and digital asset infrastructure. How do you help clients match the right route to a particular flow, and what does having several options give them when conditions change? 

“Different flows have different requirements, so the starting point is understanding what that particular transaction needs to achieve. A domestic payment, a cross-border payout and a treasury movement can have very different requirements around timing, currency, settlement finality, counterparty access, cost and operating hours. 

“Traditional banking networks remain extremely important. Domestic and instant payment systems can be very effective where institutions have appropriate access. Digital asset infrastructure can also be useful for particular settlement or liquidity scenarios, especially where availability outside conventional banking hours matters or where transactions are global. The key capability is being able to assess those routes in context and apply consistent controls across them. 

“Having several appropriate options also creates resilience. Payment routes can be affected by cut-off times, banking holidays, counterparty decisions, market developments and changes in access. Institutions with a broader infrastructure toolkit have more ability to respond when those conditions change. I increasingly see routing as an operational capability in its own right.”

Stablecoins are moving from discussion into practical use. Where do you see the clearest institutional applications in settlement and liquidity movement today? 

“The most interesting applications are emerging where there is a very specific timing or liquidity problem to solve. Stablecoin networks can allow value to move outside traditional banking hours, which creates potential applications around certain settlement, cross-border and liquidity movements. The practical availability of the full transaction, including funding, redemption and conversion back to fiat, depends on the providers and operating model involved. 

“For treasury teams, the token transfer is one part of a much wider operating model. You need to understand how value moves into the stablecoin, where exposure begins, who the counterparties are, what the redemption route looks like and how value ultimately returns to fiat. Every movement also needs to connect back into the institution’s financial records and reconciliation processes. 

“That is where institutional adoption becomes particularly interesting. The technology can be demonstrated relatively quickly. Building an operating model that works across liquidity, settlement, governance, reconciliation and control requires considerably more discipline.”

You have said that competitive advantage in payments increasingly comes from how well an institution manages settlement, liquidity and routing. For leaders building in this sector, what capabilities are worth investing in now? 

“I would focus on visibility, flexibility and control. Institutions need timely, reliable visibility over where their liquidity sits and what has actually settled. They also need strong reconciliation capabilities because increasingly complex payment infrastructure creates more sources of data that have to come together into one financial picture. 

“Routing will become increasingly important as well. Institutions need the ability to determine which infrastructure is appropriate for a particular transaction based on factors such as currency, timing, counterparty risk, cost, availability, security and settlement requirements.

“Then there is the control layer. As the number of routes increases, identity checks, sanctions screening, transaction limits, approvals and audit evidence need to remain consistent across the operating model. 

“Finally, I would invest in resilience. Every institution should understand its dependencies and its alternatives. The organisations that do this well will be able to move liquidity more intelligently, respond faster when conditions change and introduce new infrastructure with greater confidence.”