What happened
KPMG's 2026 Global AI in Finance Report, based on a survey of 1,013 senior finance leaders across 20 countries and 13 sectors (organisations with annual revenues of US$250 million+, fielded March 2026), finds that while more than three-quarters of finance organisations use AI in planning, reporting and commercial analysis and 71% report AI meeting or exceeding ROI expectations, only 23% report AI 'exceeding expectations' — a much narrower group. The report introduces a 'Decision Advantage' framework: AI is producing the strongest gains in judgment-heavy work (decision-making quality +70%, decision-making speed +71%, forecasting accuracy +64%), and organisations that can produce AI audit evidence efficiently report 3-6x the rate of significant improvement versus those that cannot (33% vs 6% on error reduction; 42% vs 14% on confidence in scaling). It sets out four priorities for finance leaders: reframe AI around value not tasks, treat governance as 'the ticket to play,' build measurement into execution, and shape the total workforce.
Why it matters
Quantifies that AI governance and audit-readiness — not raw AI adoption — is the strongest predictor of financial-function performance gains, giving CFOs and finance leaders a data-backed case to prioritize AI controls investment over further tool rollout.
Action needed
Benchmark internal finance AI governance and audit-evidence capabilities against the report's adoption/performance gap findings before further scaling agentic AI in finance functions.