More than two-thirds of investment managers prominently using AI to support front office, SimCorp study reveals

Key findings:

• Annual survey of 200 buy-side executives shows significant increase in AI adoption compared to the same time last year.
• For the first time in three years, innovation has become the leading driver of technology and operations investments.
• Firms consider vendor stability the top priority when selecting third-party AI solutions for their investment management.
• Belief that private markets and alternative investments are poised for technological innovation has risen sharply over the past 12 months.

COPENHAGEN, Denmark, Jan. 19, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- 70 percent of buy-side firms are successfully employing Artificial Intelligence to support their front office, according to a new global study commissioned by SimCorp, a global leader in financial technology.

This finding marks a significant increase from last year's report, which showed only about 10 percent of respondents were actively exploring AI tools. At the time, 75 percent recognized AI's potential, but they still needed guidance on how to integrate it.

These findings, published in the 2026 InvestOps Report, draw on responses from 200 executives at asset managers, pension funds and insurance companies worldwide. The respondents were surveyed by WBR Insights to identify their technology priorities and challenges heading into 2026.

"AI adoption has dramatically shifted from pilots to business-critical applications in the front office," said Peter Sanderson, Chief Executive Officer, SimCorp. "The advancements in AI can deliver the most value for investment professionals to enhance decision-making and efficiency when it is underpinned by a centrally governed and unified data layer."

The new report also finds that consolidating technology vendors and platforms (58%) and modernizing technology architecture and data infrastructure (54%) are the top technology initiatives for buy-side firms - both are essential for scaling AI, automating investment workflows and simplifying tech stacks.

"I'm not surprised to see 58 percent of firms in this survey choosing vendor and platform consolidation as a technology initiative," added Sanderson. "It's the first step toward bringing all their data together so they can have better control, trust their information, see their entire portfolio clearly, and use AI to gain insights."

Innovation overtakes operational efficiency as top strategic technology priority

For the first time in three years, achieving competitive differentiation through innovation (55%) has surpassed operational efficiency (33%) and controlling operating costs (44%) as the leading driver of technology and operations investments for 2026.

With AI adoption maturing across investment managers, vendor stability (57%) ranks as the most important criterion when evaluating AI solutions for their investment management - ahead of features. As proprietary data often flows into AI models, firms require that vendors have robust data governance and cybersecurity in place and are seeking partners capable of supporting these requirements.

The top factors when evaluating AI solutions for investment management were:

1. Vendor stability (57%) - Established providers with enterprise support.
2. Innovation access (54%) - Early beta features for competitive advantage.
3. Analytical flexibility (47%) - Probabilistic outputs for research and insights.
4. Proven ROI (45%) - Demonstrated return metrics before scaling deployments.
5. Governance framework (40%) - Comprehensive documentation and regulatory alignment.
6. Regulatory compliance (35%) - Deterministic, auditable outputs for compliance use cases.
7. Investment appetite (24%) - Premium pricing for advanced capabilities.

Looking ahead, respondents ranked AI, generative AI, and advanced analytics (72%) as the area offering the greatest opportunity for technological innovation. Another area poised for innovation is within alternative investments where operational complexity and fragmented data often result in limited automation. Over the past 12 months, the number of respondents who believe private markets & alternative investments offer the greatest opportunity for technological innovation has grown by 24 percentage points, reaching 51 percent in 2026 compared to 27 percent in 2025.

As private market allocations continue to rise, firms that invest in best-in-class technology capabilities for alternatives can gain operational leverage through higher straight-through processing rates, allowing them to focus on evaluating the best investment opportunities rather than manual reconciliations.

To that end, SimCorp launched SimCorp Alternatives last year, a comprehensive offering designed to serve the needs of all alternative investment firms. It builds on SimCorp's existing alternatives offering, already trusted by some of the world's largest asset owners.

To learn more about the findings of the 2026 InvestOps Report and to access the full report, click here.

Survey methodology 

The 2026 Global InvestOps Report surveyed 200 senior executives and operations leaders from asset managers, insurers, and pension funds across North America, EMEA, and Asia-Pacific, each managing at least USD 10 billion in AUM. Respondents included C-suite representatives and other senior leaders. The survey was conducted by WBR Insights, an independent research firm.

About SimCorp  

SimCorp is a provider of industry-leading integrated investment management solutions for the global buy side.

Founded in 1971, with more than 3,500 employees across five continents, SimCorp is a truly global technology leader that empowers more than half of the world's top 100 financial companies through its integrated platform, services, and partner ecosystem. 

The Axioma analytics suite provides comprehensive factor risk models, multi-asset enterprise risk management, portfolio construction, and regulatory reporting solutions. SimCorp is a subsidiary of Deutsche Börse Group. 

For more information, please visit www.simcorp.com  

Media Contact: Søren Rathlou Top, Global PR Manager at SimCorp, +45 31 15 87 06, Srat@simcorp.com  

** The press release content is from PR Newswire. Bastille Post is not involved in its creation. **

More than two-thirds of investment managers prominently using AI to support front office, SimCorp study reveals

Why fraud prevention in B2B payments starts with understanding the business, not just the transaction

BANGKOK, Nov. 10, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Recently, in response to the growing threat of cyber-enabled fraud, Bill Deng, Founder & CEO of XTransfer, has shared Three Lessons from the Front Line. Financial inclusion has been a quiet success: the World Bank's Global Findex 2025 puts account ownership at 79% of adults, up 28 points in a decade. But the Global Anti-Scam Alliance reports nearly 60% of adults encountered a scam in 2025, and a quarter lost money. Faster rails speed up legitimate and fraudulent payments alike. The Bangkok Blueprint, launched by the IMF, World Bank Group and Bank of Thailand at the 2026 Annual Meetings, frames the response correctly: cyber-enabled fraud is an ecosystem problem no single institution can solve alone.

A framework sets the direction; it does not tell an operator what to do when a payment looks unusual. Three lessons from the front line.

Speed is not the same as judgement

Automation has transformed screening. It absorbs volume no team could handle and flags anomalies in seconds. But consistency is not understanding. A model can say a transaction deviates; it cannot say whether that reflects a new customer, a seasonal order-book shift, or a fraud typology never seen in training. In B2B payments, the payment message carries almost none of the commercial history behind it: the inquiry, purchase order, shipment, invoice. Reading the underlying trade is often what separates an unusual but legitimate payment from a suspicious one. Frontline teams who know how a small exporter operates belong inside the control environment.

Share the principles; calibrate the controls

Asia-Pacific is the best test bed precisely because it is heterogeneous: regulation, rails, customer behaviour and fraud patterns differ sharply across markets. Exporting one operating model is a category error. What travels is a common language, shared risk principles and typology frameworks describing how schemes are structured, not one prescribed technical response. Controls must be calibrated locally. A multi-market compliance footprint earns its keep here: operating under several regulators forces you to separate what is universal from what is merely habitual.

Intelligence should move as fast as fraud

Fraud techniques migrate; a pattern seen in one corridor reappears, adapted, in another. If every institution treats detection as a private asset, everyone downstream starts late. Regulator-supervised, privacy-protecting sharing can turn one market's signal into another's early warning, without identical rules everywhere. More connected SME payment infrastructure helps too: today it is fragmented among banks, providers and jurisdictions, each seeing a narrow slice. The chain rarely starts in finance at all; it may begin on a social platform, marketplace or telecom network. Institutions, platforms, regulators and law enforcement each hold a fragment, which is why public-private engagement is not a courtesy but the mechanism of trust.

Access will keep expanding; whether it endures depends on trust, the cumulative result of fast technology, experienced people, controls that fit their market, and institutions willing to share what they learn. For those building infrastructure for small traders, the obligation is simple: make the safe path the easy path. Security that excludes legitimate users defeats the inclusion it protects.

The author first set out related views in a WEF Financial and Monetary Systems discussion (23 October 2026). https://www.weforum.org/stories/financial-and-monetary-systems/two-ceos-discuss-technology-enable-financial-inclusion-preventing-fraud

This is an original expansion for XTransfer's own channels; it does not reproduce or adapt the WEF text. Views are the author's own, not those of the WEF, IMF, World Bank Group or Bank of Thailand. XTransfer contributed private-sector experience to the Annual Meetings' digital safety discussions; no endorsement is implied.

** This press release is distributed by PR Newswire through automated distribution system, for which the client assumes full responsibility. **

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