Will AI replace accountants? Don’t make them laugh.

“We’ve been through it so many times,” AICPA President and CEO Mark Koziel told CFO Brew. “Every time there’s some type of innovation that comes in—AI is going to put us out of business, blockchain is going to put us out of business, the advent of the personal computer is going to put us out of business.”

Obviously, accountants are still here. And in fact, they’re starting to embrace AI and view it as a force multiplier, Koziel and other AICPA leaders said at the association’s 10th annual Engage conference, held in Las Vegas.

Accountants worldwide think the profession has a bright future, the AICPA’s Rise2040 project found through a survey of more than 6,000 accountants in 25 countries. The survey determined that 80% of accountants were optimistic about the profession; 24% said they were “very” optimistic.

Rise2040 also resurfaced a classic theme: Accountants believe that trust and human skills will remain paramount and even take on increased value in the age of AI. At a time when deepfakes and altered audio and images are easy to create, trust is crucial, Sue Coffey, CEO for public accounting at the AICPA, said during a town hall session. “You don’t know what’s real, and we are obviously a profession that provides that trust, and we need to be prepared to deliver it,” she said.

Why human judgment and advice will be accounting’s primary value drivers.—CV

The sun is out, summer’s here…but that’s not cheering CFOs up. Financial decision-makers’ outlook about the economy worsened this quarter as rising costs loomed, per the latest CFO Survey by Duke University and the Federal Reserve Banks of Richmond and Atlanta.

CFO optimism about the US economy averaged at 60.6 on a scale from 0 to 100, a dip from 61.7 in Q1 2026. The most recent survey, which polled 530 respondents, was conducted between May 18 and June 5.

Inflation reared its head again, returning to the top of CFOs’ most-pressing concerns, followed by non-labor costs and geopolitical risks, marking the first time geopolitics made an appearance on the ranking. Can’t imagine why.

And speaking of geopolitical concerns: Two-thirds of surveyed firms said increased oil prices had increased unit costs, though only one-third said the rise in oil prices impacted their firm’s prices. Not that any of that impacted demand: The majority of firms reported little or no change in demand for their firm’s goods and services as a result of increased oil prices.

Outside of specific questions about dinosaur juice, 57% of CFOs said they expect demand for their goods and services to increase in the next 12 months, while 31% anticipate demand will remain the same compared to the last 12 months.

More evidence of CFOs’ pessimistic outlook on the macroeconomy.—NP

It’s a story we’ve seen over and over again: Investors rabidly guzzle AI stocks, realize they’re overvalued, start to question everything, and spiral.

Just look at SpaceX, which tumbled 12% over the last five days, following a $20 billion bond sale. The carnage soon spread to semiconductor stocks, including memory chipmakers SK Hynix and Samsung, which both lost roughly 12% on Tuesday. And AI heavyweight Alphabet continues to sink as researchers depart for competitors.

Investors were hoping that today would be a new day, and memory chip company Micron would single-handedly turn the narrative around after reporting blowout numbers for Q3:

• Revenue quadrupled from $9.3 billion a year ago to $41.26 billion.
• The company is now projecting revenue of $50 billion for the current quarter, a wildly steep jump from the $11.3 billion it reported last year.
• Micron popped 15.81% today.

The stellar quarter was thanks to AI titans’ massive rush to build datacenters: Micron continues to capitalize on the huge demand for a small supply of memory chips, its core product.

Brew Markets explains the bearish turn in tech stocks.—LB