Articles about Finance

While banks and financial institutions generally have strong defenses, third-party vendors often lack the same levels of security, something that can offer providing attackers indirect access to the institutions they serve.

A new report from Black Kite examines the shifting landscape of cyber threats in the financial sector, highlighting the critical importance of understanding and mitigating the hidden dangers within the vendor ecosystem.

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A newly released survey of US regulatory compliance professionals shows 63 percent say that technology-driven risk is the most significant market force likely to cause compliance issues for US financial services firms in 2025.

Other forces cited are global economic instability (58 percent), increasing regulatory complexity (48 percent), digital assets and crypto markets (37 percent each) and geopolitical instability (20 percent).

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Financial institutions are facing a significant increase in deepfake fraud attempts, which have grown by a staggering 2,137 percent in the last three years.

Data from Signicat based on responses from 1,200 people in the financial and payment sectors across seven European countries, including the UK, shows that account takeover is the leading type of fraud their customers are exposed to, followed by card payment fraud and phishing.

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Artificial intelligence’s rise in business, while exciting for some, is unsettling for financial professionals. They worry AI will replace them, but understanding its true power in finance turns fear into opportunity. AI isn’t here to take over -- it’s here to level up the game. The real power lies in collaboration, not competition. Finance pros who embrace AI don’t get replaced; they get supercharged.

Traditional tedious and time-consuming tasks that keep accountants bogged down -- data entry, invoice processing, reconciliation, reporting, and more -- can now be managed by AI-powered automations. Companies gain two key benefits when they embrace the shift. First, human finance professionals are delivered from the day-to-day routine and freed up to focus on fine-tuning financial strategies in a way that can drive better business outcomes. The demands of manual accounting typically keep finance professionals from having any time to zoom out and deal with big-picture planning.

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The EU's Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) comes into force tomorrow (Jan 17th) but new research shows that 43 percent of the UK's financial organizations are set to miss the deadline for compliance, with 20 percent expecting to do so by at least four months.

Although the UK is outside the EU its strong financial ties with Europe mean firms operating in or interacting with EU markets will need to align with DORA standards to continue their business relationships.

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New research reveals the top five industries most frequently targeted by specifically tailored phishing attacks using either the recipient's name, email address, phone number, or company name.

The study from Cofense using data drawn from the Cofense Intelligence product between Q3 2023 to Q3 2024 shows, unsurprisingly, that finance tops the list, accounting for 15.5 percent of all credential phishing emails where the product redacted information from the subject in order to safeguard the recipient.

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The world is changing faster than ever, putting pressure on CFOs to create more value and be more strategic and collaborative.

Finance leaders are not only expected to understand the entire business, but they are also bogged down by the administrative work of backward-looking reporting and controls.

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Almost half of financial services leaders had a positive view of AI in 2023. But despite this initial excitement, the implementation of planned initiatives this year has been sluggish.

A new report from Lucidworks finds only one in four AI projects have been deployed, similar to many of the other industries surveyed. In 2023, the most common expected impact of Gen AI for financial services was business operations improvement. The majority of deployed initiatives followed suit in 2024, however, the industry reports below average cost and revenue benefits.

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There is no shortage of news headlines about companies falling victim to cyber breaches and the astounding costs associated with them. According to the IBM Cost of a Data Breach Report 2023, the global average cost of a data breach in 2023 was $4.45 million, a 15 percent increase since 2020. For the financial services industry, the cost is even higher at $5.9 million per breach; that is 28 percent above the global average. 

In addition to the higher price tag associated with a cyber breach, companies within the financial industry must also adhere to evolving compliance regulations that dictate how they respond to an attack and where they must invest to reduce the total risk.

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Generative AI has the potential to reshape entire industries and how they operate, and financial services stand out as uniquely poised for AI-driven transformation. McKinsey & Company calls generative AI the next frontier for productivity, estimating that analyzing natural language text -- a core generative AI use case -- accounts for an average of 25 percent of the time people spend in any given enterprise.

The finance industry is a data-driven industry, so it’s no surprise that finance sector firms see big potential in using generative AI to tackle use cases that require assessing enormous amounts of unstructured data, such as company due diligence, know-your-customer (KYC) requirements, sustainability research, and controversy monitoring.

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In common with many industries, the digital transformation era has ushered in a paradigm shift in the tax and accountancy sectors. This has placed automation and artificial intelligence (AI) at the center of operational innovation, efficiency and competitive advantage. In doing so, these and other technologies are redefining the way industry professionals approach their work, with profound implications for the future.

Among the key questions this creates are: what does this all mean for human skillsets and expertise, and how can businesses balance these changes with uniquely human capabilities, ensuring that one complements the other? In looking for answers, there are several key areas to consider:

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From Here to Financial Happiness is the day-by-day guide for anyone dreaming of a better life. Whether you’re dealing with debt, uncertain about retirement or simply want to get a grip on your finances, this book can put you on the road to happiness with a simple 11-week journey. Just 5-10 minutes a day to think about money, your habits, your goals, and your dreams.

What steps can you take today to get your finances on track? What bad habits, bad investments, and misconceptions should you let go of? This book is packed with 77 days’ worth of real, actionable guidance for getting your money right -- for good.

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A tug-of-war between finance and cloud leaders is preventing enterprises from controlling their cloud spending, according to new research.

The study from Vertice, of 600 senior finance and tech leaders in the US and UK, shows cutting cloud spending is revealed as the number one cost-saving priority for over a third of finance leaders, but only nine percent of technical leaders say that managing cloud costs is a top concern.

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A new study from Lucidworks shows that businesses across the board are planning to increase their investment in AI over the next year, with financial services companies among those leading the charge.

The survey of over 6,000 employees involved in AI technology decision-making finds 94 percent of financial services firms planning to boost generative AI investments within the year. However, the survey found differences depending on location. 100 percent of Chinese financial services employees and 97 percent of UK respondents surveyed say they plan to increase investment, compared to only 91 percent of US companies.

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Financial services firms deploy an increasingly complicated mix of technologies, systems, applications, and processes to serve customers and partners and to solve organizational challenges. Focused heavily on consumer hyper-personalization, banks are evolving more and more digital assets and services to meet and exceed growing customer experience expectations. 

As a result, the modern banking environment is heavily reliant on APIs to the point that they are now indispensable. APIs allow financial banks to connect with their ecosystem, while inspiring innovative developers to create new products, improve existing services, and work more efficiently. 

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