2026 Planning for SEC and FINRA Examination Priorities in a Principle-Based, AI-Heavy Environment

The SEC and FINRA have entered a principle-based regulatory era that demands stronger internal standards, clearer documentation, and greater accountability from firms.

FINRA’s mission to protect investors and promote market integrity drives everything we do, including our commitment to transparency and collaboration with our member firms.Whenever possible, we share actionable insights from our oversight activities to help firms enhance their resiliency and strengthen their compliance programs. Of all the publications we deliver, this Annual Regulatory Oversight Report is the most anticipated, with the greatest engagement of any of our resources.

SurgeONE.ai, a Surge Ventures company and the first Agentic AI-platform purpose-built to unify compliance, cybersecurity and data operations, today announced the acquisition of MGL Consulting (MGL), one of the most respected and established compliance firms in the financial services industry.

AI will face “traditional” controls. Expect exam teams to apply long-standing expectations (books & records, supervision, documentation) to AI-generated outputs from surveillance alerts to marketing reviews.Transparency is the test. Firms should be able to explain what an AI tool does, what data it relies on, how results are reviewed, and how exceptions/escalations are handled.Expert-led governance wins.

At SurgeONE, we’ve always believed that technology alone isn’t enough to manage compliance in a rapidly changing world. Real progress comes when deep expertise and advanced AI work together, and with the new SurgeOne, that vision is becoming reality. This release is more than a feature update. It marks the foundation of what we see as the next generation of compliance and cyber management, which is expert-led, intelligent by design, and built for scale.

Missed our 30-minute expert panel? No worries, catch the full recording below and skim the highlights to get the key takeaways in minutes. The session, “Expert Panel: Choosing the Right RIA Compliance Partner in 2025,” ran on August 20, 2025 and brought together Mimi LeGaye (President & Co-Founder, MGL Consulting) and Sid Yenamandra (Founder & CEO, Surge Ventures) for a practical, no-fluff briefing on how RIAs should evaluate compliance partners this year.

In a landscape where an organization’s reputation and market goodwill can be as valuable as financial capital, regulatory alignment sets the tone for sustained success. Establishing credibility in the wealth management sector begins with a firm commitment towards compliance and integrity.

The SEC's 2026 Examination Priorities is out, and it focuses on investor protection, compliance effectiveness, and emerging risks. Key areas include fiduciary duties, marketing practices, valuation, custody, and annual compliance reviews. Cybersecurity, vendor oversight, and the use of Al in advisory services remain top concerns, along with compliance with updated Regulation S-P and identity theft prevention rules.

In the ever-evolving landscape of compliance practices, emerging technologies like ChatGPT garner significant attention from compliance professionals. It’s all too easy to recognize the potential of these tools to streamline repetitive tasks, enhance supervisory review, and transform compliance practices.

Providing firm personnel with an understanding of their role in protecting attorney-client privilege is a critical requirement to enact effective technology and communication policies.

When firms are proactive in educating their staff, that training should not only define attorney-client privilege, but also help staff identify which communications can, and should, be privileged.

One of the tools most routinely utilized by financial regulators is the requested production of electronic communications, both as part of cause and cycle examinations of member firms.

The 2025 FINRA Annual Regulatory Oversight Report (the Report) provides FINRAmember firms (firms) with insight into findings from FINRA’s regulatory operationsprograms.

Division of Examinations (Division or EXAMS).1 Sincethat time, the securities markets have undergone significant transformations, evolving from brokers using faxmachines and open outcry floor trading, to an online, globally interconnected high-speed marketplace.