What happened
KPMG's survey of 1,013 senior finance leaders across 20 countries finds that "71 percent report AI is meeting or exceeding ROI expectations in their finance function," with active AI use across finance more than doubling from 30% in 2024 to 75% in 2026. The strongest gains concentrate in judgment-heavy work — decision-making quality (70%), speed (71%), and forecast accuracy (64%) — not transactional automation. Organizations deploying agentic AI report at least 32 percentage points stronger performance across key finance metrics, rising to nearly 40 points on forecast accuracy and ROI. The defining split: assurance-ready organizations that can produce AI audit evidence efficiently report 3-6× the rate of significant improvement compared to those without governance (33% versus 6% on error reduction, 42% versus 14% on confidence in scaling). The survey, fielded in March 2026, documents that adoption maturity is outpacing operating capability — only 23% report AI exceeding expectations, and 36% cite data quality as both the top barrier and opportunity.
Why it matters
This is the first large-scale survey evidence that governance is a performance multiplier, not a compliance cost. Finance leaders facing board pressure to demonstrate AI ROI now have quantitative benchmarks for where gains concentrate, and empirical proof that assurance readiness predicts outcomes better than KPI tracking alone. The 3-6× governance premium contradicts the widespread assumption that controls slow deployment.
Action needed
CFOs and Chief Audit Executives should assess whether their organization can produce AI audit evidence efficiently today — the survey suggests this capability is the strongest predictor of scaling confidence. Finance teams should prioritize AI deployment in decision-making and forecasting workflows over transactional automation, where the data shows judgment-augmentation delivers 2× the gains.