Companies promised AI gains - here's how the payoff showed up in earnings

Some companies are beginning to report financial benefits from artificial intelligence investments, as interest in the technology shifts from hype to measurable returns in the latest quarter.

Corporate AI investment has surged as companies look to boost efficiency and become more profitable, reaching $581.7 billion in 2025, up 130% from the previous year, according to the Stanford HAI 2026 AI Index report .

As CEOs tout the tech's benefits and hyperscalers like Microsoft , Amazon , Google and Meta are expected to spend $700 billion combined this year on its infrastructure, investors are looking for measurable gains.

Now, with third-quarter earnings season underway, some companies are beginning to put numbers around those benefits.

Spanish banking giant Santander said Wednesday that it saw AI initiatives generate 194 million euros ($216 million) in business value in the first nine months of 2026 .

Santander Chief Financial Officer José García Cantera told CNBC that AI is helping the bank reduce low-value tasks so employees can focus on higher-value work.

"This affects both revenue and costs, so we are actually in the quarter where we can actually link directly to AI a positive contribution," Cantera said.

"AI is being embedded in all the processes that we are conducting at the bank, so it's really difficult to just say how much comes from AI, but clearly AI is improving the quality of our services to clients."

Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis CEO Vas Narasimhan told CNBC that AI was beginning to contribute to the company's bottom line.

Novartis reported third-quarter core operating income of $6.04 billion, up 10% year-on-year at constant currencies. The company did not quantify how much of that was attributable to AI but Narasimhan told CNBC: "I think this is the first quarter I've really seen AI start to improve actually our P&L on a tangible basis."

"We're working on R&D [research & development] to see if it can really increase R&D productivity," Narasimhan said on "Squawk Box Europe" on Tuesday.

"We're already seeing some of the productivity you saw in the bottom-line performance of what we can do with AI from M&S [marketing & sales]."

Meanwhile, Standard Chartered Chief Financial Officer Manus Costello told "Squawk Box Europe" on Wednesday that the company is seeing AI "appear everywhere across the business."