77% of CFOs plan to increase tech spending this year

CFOs have had to make various accommodations to weather the continuing economic turbulence, but one thing they generally don’t seem to be doing is dampening their spending on technology. 

In a Gartner survey of 301 CFOs and other senior finance leaders, conducted last fall, 77% of the respondents said they planned to increase their budget for technology in 2025. Almost half (47%) of surveyed CFOs predicted a spending boost of at least 10%. 

Those increases far surpassed expected budget hikes for such areas as cost of goods sold, staff headcount, staff compensation, external services, contractors and facilities. 

The results underscore the critical role of technology in driving profitable growth and efficiency across industries, Gartner said in a news release. 

On the other hand, spending on compensation is moderating. Just 61% of CFOs said they planned to increase employee pay in 2025, compared with 71% in 2024 and 86% in 2023, Gartner reported. 

Additionally, the proportion of CFOs planning to boost employee compensation by at least 10% fell from 16% in 2023 to 11% in 2025. 

Companies have been spending aggressively on technology for some time. A year ago, 50% of CFOs said they planned to boost such spending by at least 10% in 2024 after 43% of finance chiefs had said the same the previous year. 

Meanwhile, another recent Gartner research effort, polling 251 CFOs, provided a different way to underscore the key role finance chiefs are playing in technology. That is, 76% of those polled said they owned their company’s enterprise data and analytics function. 

That was more than the proportion of CFOs that owned enterprise risk management, corporate strategy, M&A, or procurement.