PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct 28, 2026--
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The HTEC AI Value Realization Report 2026: Financial Services & Insurance, found that among FSI respondents currently pursuing AI adoption, 88% report increasing investment over the past 12 months. Forty-two per cent describe the increase as significant, compared with 28% across all industries. Yet 44% of FSI organizations are at the scaling stage or already AI-native, exactly the same proportion as the overall sample.
The findings suggest that high levels of investment alone are not translating into a sector-wide maturity advantage. Seventy-eight per cent of FSI respondents agree that people and processes limit the value organizations derive from AI more than technology does.
“ Financial institutions are investing heavily, but technology alone does not determine whether AI creates value,” said Philip Otley, Global Managing Partner at HTEC. “ Results depend heavily on what happens around the technology: how AI is integrated into workflows, who owns the outcome, and whether employees are equipped to use it consistently.”
Better decisions, not simply lower costs
The research also points to what FSI leaders want AI investment to deliver.
Better decision quality is the most desired outcome of AI investment, cited by 31% of executives, compared with 17% who prioritize cost reduction.
The finding reinforces the importance of being able to demonstrate value beyond traditional efficiency measures. Improvements in decision quality require credible baselines, trustworthy data, and evidence connecting AI-supported decisions to business outcomes.
However, the research shows significant differences in when organizations establish and assess financial returns. Thirty-four per cent require a formal ROI model before an AI initiative is approved, while 29% assess returns only after implementation.
Together, these findings indicate that defining and measuring value throughout the AI investment lifecycle remains an important part of the maturity challenge.
AI risk measurement remains inconsistent
The research identifies a parallel challenge around governance.
Forty-two per cent of FSI respondents consider AI risk informally alongside value, while only 16% measure risk consistently across their portfolios.
As AI becomes more deeply embedded into financial services workflows, HTEC believes appropriate oversight will become increasingly important, particularly where AI supports consequential decisions within regulated operations.
“ Not every AI-assisted decision requires the same level of oversight,” said Lawrence Whittle, Chief Strategy Officer at HTEC. “ The challenge is designing review processes that are proportionate to the risk involved, while ensuring that people have enough context and authority to exercise meaningful judgment when it matters.”
Organizations are also relying more heavily on external expertise
The research suggests that the complexity of moving AI beyond individual initiatives is also affecting how FSI organizations work with external partners.
21.5% of FSI respondents report greater dependence on external partners or consultants than they had anticipated, indicating that moving AI from isolated use cases towards enterprise-wide deployment increasingly requires strategy, data, engineering, and governance to work together. Multidisciplinary teams can work alongside internal stakeholders to connect these capabilities as use cases move from roadmap to production.
Turning investment into value
Taken together, the findings suggest that the next phase of AI adoption in financial services and insurance will depend not simply on deploying more technology, but on strengthening the conditions around it.
The research points towards five areas: clear business outcomes, trustworthy data, defined ownership, consistent measurement, and proportionate governance.
For HTEC, this also changes the role of technology partners. Financial institutions increasingly need strategy and engineering to connect with implementation and organizational change, together with the transparency, safeguards, and traceability required to understand how AI-supported decisions were reached and whether they delivered the intended outcome.
About the Research
The findings are based on responses from 235 financial services and insurance C-suite executives within a global survey of 1,500. The research was commissioned by HTEC and conducted by Censuswide in July 2026.
The full HTEC AI Value Realization Report 2026: Financial Services & Insurance is available at https://htec.com/insights/reports/the-htec-ai-value-realization-report-2026-financial-services-insurance/.
About HTEC
HTEC Group Inc. HTEC is a global technology and engineering company that helps organizations build AI capabilities from silicon to outcomes. HTEC helps its customers build an adaptive, vendor-agnostic AI stack designed to evolve as technologies, models, and platforms change.
Through its forward-deployed model, HTEC works alongside customer’s teams to connect AI to business strategy and create a repeatable capability consistently and faster each time. OneLoopAi is at the heart of this approach and brings greater transparency in measuring progress and continuously improves how AI is developed and deployed. The result is a stronger path from AI investment to measurable business value and AI at scale.
With more than 15 years of experience working with AI and machine learning, HTEC combines deep engineering expertise with strategy, product, design, and data capabilities to turn AI ambition into production.
HTEC, the global AI technology and engineering leader, today released its research on AI Value realization in financial services and Insurance. Organizations in this sector are increasing AI investment more aggressively than the wider market, but the sector has yet to establish a corresponding lead in AI maturity, according to new research from HTEC.
LONDON (AP) — British Treasury chief John Healey used his first budget statement Wednesday to offer households and businesses support with their energy bills this winter in the face of what he termed “global economic storms.”
Healey, who was appointed chancellor of the exchequer in July when Andy Burnham became prime minister, said the Iran war was not something the British government wanted but that it had no alternative but to deal with the economic repercussions.
As a result, he said his “choice in the budget today is to give families and businesses some breathing space now,” as the consequences of the conflict in the Gulf played out.
“For families, that means higher prices at the pump, higher energy bills and higher mortgages,” he said in his statement, arguably the key set piece of the parliamentary calendar. “For businesses, higher running costs and more expensive loans. And the impact is felt in the public finances too. Driven by the conflict in the Middle East, government borrowing costs across the G7 are reaching highs not seen for decades.”
Among the support measures announced in the early stages of Healey's speech was a 100-pound ($133) one-off payment this winter that will help 20 million lower- and middle-income households, proportionately more of whom live in the electoral battlegrounds in northern England.
Other measures announced include the extension of a cut in the sales tax on electricity bills and the abolition of a charge paid on gas bills.
Energy bills are set to spike sharply for households and businesses in the coming winter months as they track developments in the oil and gas markets. The Iran war and the ensuing bottlenecks in the Strait of Hormuz have squeezed global oil and gas supplies, pushing prices higher.
Healey said the banks, which have benefited from higher interest rates, will foot the bill for the support package. He increased the surcharge on their profits from 3% to 6% but only for 15 months beginning in January.
“Amid global economic storms, I am looking to our banks to help fund breathing space for British families,” he said.
Outside of the energy price support, Healey’s overall budget was relatively low-key, especially at a time when bond markets are fretting over debt levels around the world. France has been in the spotlight recently following a wave of protests that have exposed the parlous state of its finances.
Still, he offered tax cuts for retail hospitality and leisure businesses, such as pubs and clubs, which will be paid for by the gambling sector through increasing the tax they have to pay for their machine games.
He also committed more money to reduce homelessness and said the government has a “target date” of spending 3% of the country's annual GDP on defense by 2030 — the commitment that NATO members have already made.
For Healey, this is a touchstone issue as he quit as defense secretary earlier this year in protest at the lack of money being provided, a move that heaped pressure on Burnham’s predecessor, Keir Starmer.
Getting to 3% from the current 2.7% will cost billions more, and Healey said he will outline how that will be done when the government unveils its three-year spending plans next year.
He also announced 10 billion pounds more of economic and military support for Ukraine.
“Today we send a clear message to Moscow: Britain will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes,” he said.
Healey said the British economy has been more resilient than anticipated this year and, according to the latest forecast from the independent Office for Budget Responsibility, will grow by 1.2% in 2026.
However, growth next year is expected to be much weaker than anticipated at 1% instead of 1.6% as a result of the Iran war economic shock.
“Yes, there are real challenges ahead, but Britain has beaten the forecasts this year,” he said. “And with the action I’m taking today, I believe Britain can beat them again.”
Prior to the global financial crisis of 2008, the British economy's trend growth rate was around 2.5% and governments since have struggled to get back to those sorts of levels — Britain's departure from the European Union, the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia's invasion of Ukraine have all contributed to this period of sub-par growth.
The main impact of the Iran war has been on inflation, which was due to fall earlier this year to the Bank of England’s 2% target. It has risen and is set to rise further over the coming year or two.
Inflation in the U.K. has risen to a near one-year high of 3.5% and is expected to rise further in the coming months. As a result, the Bank of England is expected to raise interest rates soon, which will further raise the costs to the government of servicing its debt.
Arguably, the main economic problem facing Healey is the same as that which confronted his predecessor Rachel Reeves, who was chancellor after Labour returned to power in a landslide election victory — the country's debt mountain.
Even though the trajectory of the public finances was recently given a nod of approval from the International Monetary Fund, the U.K.’s debt has passed 3 trillion pounds ($4 trillion) for the first time ever, requiring 8% of government spending to service it.
Healey said that in forecasts provided by the independent Office for Budget Responsibility, the U.K. will spend 14 billion pounds more on debt interest this year.
“Those are the storms we face,” he said. “We can’t wish them away.”
Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey poses on the doorstep of 11 Downing Street with the ministerial red box before heading to the House of Commons to deliver the budget statement in London, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026.(AP Photo/Thomas Krych)
Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, John Healey, holds up the traditional red ministerial box outside No 11 Downing Street before departing to the House of Commons to deliver the first budget in London, England, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026. (Dylan Martinez/Pool Photo via AP)
Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey leaves 11 Downing Street with the ministerial red box heading to the House of Commons to deliver the budget statement in London, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026.(AP Photo/Thomas Krych)
Britain's Prime Minister Andy Burnham leaves 10 Downing Street to attend the weekly Prime Ministers' Questions session in parliamentin London, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026.(AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey poses on the doorstep of 11 Downing Street with the ministerial red box before heading to the House of Commons to deliver the budget statement in London, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026.(AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey poses on the doorstep of 11 Downing Street with the ministerial red box before heading to the House of Commons to deliver the budget statement in London, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026.(AP Photo/Thomas Krych)
Britain's Prime Minister Andy Burnham, right, and Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey meet ahead of the UK budget at 11 Downing Street in London, Monday, Oct. 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali, Pool)
Britain's Prime Minister Andy Burnham, right, and Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey meet ahead of the UK budget at 11 Downing Street in London, Monday, Oct. 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali, Pool)
Britain's Prime Minister Andy Burnham, right, and Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey meet ahead of the UK budget at 11 Downing Street in London, Monday, Oct. 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali, Pool)
