Cecilia Lu

• Collaborate with fund administrators to oversee day-to-day fund operations, ensuring accurate and timely production of bank reconciliations, monthly/quarterly management accounts, and investor reports, while maintaining consistently high standard of accuracy and attention to detail
• Work with tax advisers to review VAT returns and ensure accurate and compliant tax reporting for funds
• Prepare annual audit files and accounts, acting as primary point of contact with external auditors, such as Deloitte, to facilitate efficient and effective audits
• Support quarterly valuation reporting to CPPIB, working closely with investment team to analyse key drivers behind valuation movements
• Develop and manage 12-month rolling cash flow forecast to assist CFO with capital calls, distributions, and management fee decisions
• Drive implementation of Equipped AI data warehouse, analysing monthly portfolio collections, expenses, funding movements, and bank reconciliations to improve data quality for portfolio management team
• Assist auditors in testing business plans for complex areas, including roll-forward cash flows and sensitivity analysis, segregation of valuation between loan entity and real estate entity, and justifying cost assumptions
• Assist with quarterly leverage facility covenant and repayment reporting to meet required regulatory standards
• Proactively engage with internal and external stakeholders, providing solutions to operational and financial challenges related to fund management
• Actively contribute to various ad-hoc projects aimed at improving fund oversight models, processes, and controls, consistently seeking opportunities to enhance operational efficiency and support team's overall success

Investment Monitoring, 03/2022 - 01/2023

• Managed eFront digital transformation and visualisation project, streamlining data collection, portfolio monitoring, and leveraging data-driven analytics to improve fund control processes
• Ran quarter-end process in eFront, including detailed analysis and resolution of variances on cashflows, commitments, unfunded capital, net asset valuation ('NAV'), roll-forward NAV, carried interests, and investment level valuation movement
• Onboarded, troubleshot and tested data: capital account statements and cashflows like capital calls and distributions, from Investran to eFront Invest
• Validated migration of portfolio company data and valuation (IRR, EV, EBITDA, Multiples, and Profitability) from iLevel to eFront Insight, enhancing insights and control over investment data to support value creation decision-making
• Collaborated with eFront consultants to re-map processes and develop Excel-based reporting and validation tools for greater effectiveness
• Ensured adherence to internal controls and proper documentation for new procedures

Treasury & Fund Reporting, 11/2021 - 02/2022

• Produced daily cash flow report and forecasts within 3-month time frame, timing capital calls and distributions by investments and to LPs and reconciled loan facilities and net cash positions, to achieve accurate and efficient treasury management
• Prepared investor call notices for new investments and investor distribution notices
• Collaborated with data analytics team to enhance visualisation of cash flow report, investor calls and distributions projection in Qlik
• Reviewed 1 flagship fund and numerous SPVs' financials, waterfalls and capital accounts prepared by administrators to produce accurate quarterly accounts
• Reconciled and analysed quarterly expenses and accruals by fund, SPVs and deals, ensuring their adherence to budget and inter-companies' recharges policy

• Responsible for Interim and Annual Reports and monthly closing of financial results of HSBC Europe and UK; key contact for year-end audit process
• Supervised operations team in India, resolving issues and providing technical knowledge, i.e., IAS 19 Pension, IFRS 12 Structured Entities, and IFRS 9 Financial Instruments
• Produced monthly management pack to include analysis and variance explanation of income statement, provisions, and contingent liabilities
• Interacted with wider stakeholders each quarter to track strategic changes within bank and assess their financial and accounting impacts
• Led project to implement Qlik business intelligence tool to improve efficiency and visualisation of financial reporting
• Modeled financial valuation for assessing impairment of goodwill and investment in subsidiaries, displaying sound analytical skills
• Spearheaded standardization and optimization of monthly journal procedures within Excel, saving numerous working days and eliminating manual process in consolidation; project won 2nd place of HSBC FinOps Stop and Simplify initiative
• Initiated wide-ranging review of risk-rating model and analytical review templates, thereby streamlining and enhancing reporting procedures and shortening team turnaround time
• Three months' secondment to ESG: conducted peer analysis of 14 international banks' ESG reporting, proposing to senior financial officers for development of range of enhancements