The financial sector has become the great testing ground to evaluate whether the fever for Artificial Intelligence is tangibly transforming the daily operations of the business. However, a new study presented by Pleo reveals that the speed of technology adoption is outpacing companies’ ability to translate innovation into quantifiable value.
The report, prepared from the responses of more than 3,600 financial leaders in five European markets, including 1,000 professionals in Spain, shows that 74% of managers in this area in our country have invested in AI projects whose real ROI is still unknown. Additionally, 45% acknowledge that accumulating siled tools has triggered an “AI sprawl” within their own finance departments.
Accumulating AI tools does not mean gaining productivity
Despite the rapid arrival of technological solutions to offices, financial departments in Spain remain buried under mountains of reconciliations, spreadsheets and operational bureaucracy. Everyday tasks such as reconciling expenses, preparing reports, pursuing approvals or correcting budget deviations consume an average of 25.6 hours per week per finance team.
This inefficiency eats up time that should be dedicated to corporate leadership: 59% of financial professionals in Spain admit to dedicating more energy to monitoring spending than participating in the company’s strategy, while 52% rate current spending control flows as an excessive burden.
Digital maturity does not solve the problem either
The challenge does not disappear when companies gain technological maturity. Among Spanish organizations that declare themselves advanced users of AI, 89% claim to obtain a tangible ROI at a general level. However, this same group is the one that suffers the worst technological dispersion: 63% suffer from an overaccumulation of AI tools without connection to each other and 86% admit to continuing to invest in specific initiatives without a clear return.
The data in the report demonstrate that the challenge is no longer accessing technology, but rather putting it in order: controlling its proliferation, unifying the data it generates in a coherent way and measuring its real impact on the business. For financial teams, this issue is especially relevant, since their activity requires having accurate, connected and accessible information to make decisions.
AI needs clear boundaries, not more licenses
Financial managers in Spain are clear that buying more software without control is not the solution. 79% maintain that their teams must be trained to use AI intelligently and 75% recognize that the future of their profession will depend on mastering this technology. Despite this, 62% warn that training, skills and confidence in the use of AI are far behind what is necessary.
At the same time, managers set clear operational boundaries. When analyzing typical financial processes, 35% would favor a mostly or entirely AI-led model for fraud detection, while 59% prefer that final approval of payments continue to be firmly in human hands. The new phase of maturity requires redesigning processes based on a deliberate and strategic division of labor between people and technology.
According to Jeppe Rindom, CEO and co-founder of Pleo: «The financial area has become the great thermometer of corporate Artificial Intelligence. Adoption has accelerated and the productivity potential is evident, but where results fall short, companies must take a closer look at what processes they are automating, whether the data they manage is accessible and reliable, and how technology is integrated into daily work. The question is no longer if they will use AI, but where and how to achieve maximum impact. If we are not able to demonstrate a real operational change in finance, we will have to ask more uncomfortable questions about what exactly AI investments are bringing to the rest of the company.
Pleo launches its MCP infrastructure
To address the dispersion of tools and achieve effective integration, Pleo has launched its MCP (Model Context Protocol) infrastructure, which securely connects the Pleo spending platform with the AI assistants preferred by companies, such as ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini.
Pleo has launched the integration of its MCP (Model Context Protocol) protocol, which connects real-time financial data with AI assistants
Thanks to this universal architecture, finance teams can view transactions, approve expenses, reconcile accounts or generate executive reports in real time directly from their usual workspace, eliminating the wear and tear of constantly switching solutions.
Jeppe Rindom adds: “Pleo’s new agentic capabilities reflect a broader shift in spend management towards greater efficiency driven by artificial intelligence. As pioneers in this sector, we have always focused on shaping the future. Pleo has evolved alongside our customers, moving from expense management to a comprehensive expense management platform that supports larger, more complex businesses. “Our newly refreshed brand reflects that evolution and the role that finance teams play today: simplifying complexity, acting judiciously, and helping businesses make better decisions.”
