In our 2026 AscentAI RegTech Benchmark Survey, respondents ranked monitoring regulatory updates as a major challenge.
When asked to rank the five most difficult elements of their regulatory change management process, risk and compliance professionals from regional banks, investment banks, and broker-dealer firms ranked regulatory monitoring at the top.
APAC respondents overall cited monitoring regulators as the most difficult element of the entire change management lifecycle.
Why monitoring is so hard
Several challenges have to be overcome before you can effectively and efficiently monitor for regulatory change.
- Volume: Thousands of regulators across dozens of jurisdictions issue updates on overlapping timelines. The deluge of regulatory content easily overwhelm maxed-out teams.
- Relevance: Since not every update applies to every organization, teams need sophisticated filtering so they don’t miss relevant content buried beneath irrelevant noise.
- Connectivity: Even when a regulatory change is captured, it must be connected to the obligations it affects and the downstream actions it should trigger.
Manual monitoring processes compound each of these problems. Search tools and email subscriptions catch some things, but rarely eliminate all irrelevant content, and rarely connect a change to the downstream actions required for compliance.
What continuous monitoring looks like
Advanced horizon scanning tools function as the foundation for managing regulatory change. They’re the first step in a chain of events (hopefully automated) that massively simplify and greatly improve compliance processes. Such horizon scanning tools provide:
- Continuous monitoring of global regulatory sources
- Automated daily alerts of relevant regulatory updates and rule changes
- Powerful filters deliver information tailored to specific needs and interests, eliminating irrelevant content
- Intelligent linking of related content to ensure users have a 360-degree perspective
- Workflow tools and templates for efficient task management
- Built-in audit trails
Evolving to continuous compliance monitoring requires four things:
- Monitoring every relevant source continuously
- Capturing updates automatically, and aggregating them into a single source of truth tailored to your specific business
- Filtering intelligently so only relevant updates reach the right people
- Linking captured content to your obligations and downstream change management processes
When you get all three right, you’ll be informed of every relevant regulatory change, while ensuring the right people have the right information to maintain compliance.
Download the full Benchmark Report to dive deeper into what we heard about the current state of RegTech in the financial services marketplace.
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