A CBI survey published in September 2025 found that financial services firms expected to increase IT investment over the following 12 months, while capital expenditure on land and buildings and on vehicles, plant and machinery was set to fall.
Financial services firms expected to spend more on IT over the next 12 months compared with the previous 12 months, according to the Confederation of British Industry’s Financial Services Survey for September 2025, produced in partnership with PwC. At the same time, the figures show that capital expenditure on land and buildings and on vehicles, plant and machinery was expected to decline.
The expected falls in those two physical asset categories were, however, smaller than those recorded in the previous quarter — suggesting the pace of reduction may be easing, though the survey doesn’t confirm that direction will hold.
It’s worth being clear about what the survey does and doesn’t measure. The findings represent a balance of firms expecting increases versus decreases — not a forecast of total monetary value. No independently verified spending figures were attached to the results.
IT expenditure in this context covers hardware, software, personnel and other IT-related costs. So the shift toward IT and away from property and physical equipment may point to continued prioritisation of digital systems, but the survey does not establish why individual firms are making those decisions.
A later CBI financial services survey, published on 8 January 2026, reported a broadly similar pattern — firms again planned to increase IT spending while reducing capital expenditure on land and buildings and on vehicles, plant and machinery.
These are investment intentions, not confirmed outcomes. Whether the spending materialises as planned nobody knows yet.
Source: @CBItweets
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