Blog
Explainers and worked examples on financial due diligence, audit and controls, and valuation — and how finance teams turn raw data into defensible, fully sourced work.
Audit & assuranceBest AI tools for KYC and AML (2026)
KYC and AML isn't one job — it's identity verification, sanctions/PEP screening, transaction monitoring, risk scoring, and defensible write-up. An honest walk through the tools worth knowing in 2026 (Sumsub, Trulioo, World-Check, NICE Actimize, MacrosLM, and more), what each is for, and where each stops.
7 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceWhat is a trial balance?
A trial balance lists every general-ledger account and its balance in debit and credit columns, to check that the two sides tie before financial statements are built on top. Why it exists, the unadjusted/adjusted/post-closing versions, where it sits in the accounting cycle, and a live ten-column worksheet.
7 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceWhat is segregation of duties?
Segregation of duties splits a process across more than one person so no single individual controls it end to end — why it's one of the cheapest, most effective anti-fraud controls, the conflicts auditors flag most, how SOX enforces it, and a live ERP access-conflict test.
6 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceBest AI tools for SOX compliance (2026)
SOX compliance spans running the program, collecting ITGC evidence, and the testing and workpaper. A 2026 roundup, led by the tool for the slowest part — the control testing and the defensible ICFR workpaper (MacrosLM) — plus the strongest program-of-record and evidence-automation options to build around it.
7 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceBest AI tools for audit automation (2026)
The AI audit tools worth knowing in 2026, by category — agentic workspaces that build the deliverable (MacrosLM), document automation in Excel (DataSnipper), GRC platforms (AuditBoard), and anomaly detection (MindBridge) — plus how to pick for your bottleneck.
10 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceWhat is KYC risk scoring?
How financial institutions rate each customer's money-laundering risk and sort them into tiers — the FATF factors that drive a score, how tiers map to due diligence, the risk-based regulatory basis, and how AI and the EU AI Act are reshaping it in 2026.
11 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceWhat is journal entry testing?
The audit procedure that hunts for financial-statement manipulation hidden in the general ledger — why AU-C 240 and AS 2401 require it, the red flags that trigger scrutiny, and how AI is shifting it toward full-population testing in 2026.
8 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceWhat is a three-way match?
The AP control that checks the purchase order, the receiving report, and the invoice before a bill gets paid — and the same logic, applied to revenue, that proves each recognized dollar is real.
9 min readRead more
Audit & assuranceWhat is SOX control testing?
How a public company proves its financial-reporting controls are designed well and operating effectively under Section 404 — what gets tested, how failures are rated, and how AI is reshaping it in 2026.
12 min readRead more