How AI is becoming central to oil and gas finance strategy

Discover how AI-enabled finance helps oil and gas companies accelerate cash flow, strengthen resilience, reduce risk and fund the energy transition.

In brief

• AI-enabled finance helps oil and gas companies unlock liquidity, reduce DSO, resolve disputes faster and accelerate cash flow in volatile markets.
• Five integrated levers – AI-driven credit decisions, order smoothing, customer-to-cash integrity, platform integration and CFO-CIO governance – together create a self‑correcting cash engine.
• Agentic AI enables autonomous cash orchestration by preventing blocks, correcting billing issues early and driving faster collections with real-time cash visibility.

Oil and gas chief financial officers (CFOs) today are navigating one of the toughest liquidity environments in decades. Even as companies invest billions in decarbonization, digital infrastructure, hydrogen pathways and long‑cycle asset renewal, free cash flow continues to tighten. Crude‑price volatility, margin compression and cautious credit markets further restrict access to external capital. Yet ironically, billions in potential liquidity are trapped internally, locked in receivables, billing friction, disputes, fragmented operations and legacy processes built for a steadier era.

Analysis in the latest white paper by EY, ‘Cash in the barrel: Working capital management in the oil and gas industry,’ shows that despite improvements over the last decade, North American oil and gas companies still have more than CAD$230 billion tied up in working capital¹. Globally, AI, predictive automation and integrated digital platforms could unlock US$1.6 trillion to US$2.5 trillion in value² over the next decade. For CFOs and chief information officers (CIOs), the question is no longer, “Where can we find liquidity?” but rather, “How quickly can we mobilize liquidity that already exists?”

Why is cash release now a strategic priority?

Three forces are strategically shifting the industry’s ability to manage liquidity in traditional ways:

• The energy transition is accelerating: Much of the transition should be funded internally. Capital‑intensive sustainability and infrastructure programs require predictable liquidity, something many organizations cannot rely on with current order‑to‑cash (OTC) processes.

• Commodity cycles are shortening: Demand shifts, geopolitical disruptions and algorithmic trading are compressing crude‑price cycles. Reaction windows shrink, while volatility amplifies swings in Days Sales Outstanding (DSO), credit exposure and working capital needs.

• AI has matured into a deployable cash engine: With predictive models, autonomous workflows and Agentic AI, finance can now prevent cash issues before they occur, avoiding credit blocks, correcting billing errors and accelerating collections.

Five enterprise levers to accelerate cash

• AI‑driven credit‑to‑cash excellence: Volatility requires dynamic, real‑time credit decisions. Oil‑ and gas‑specific automation, uplift‑to‑invoice matching, pricing formula validation, excise‑tax intelligence and predictive collections can reduce DSO by five to ten days and eliminate 2% to 4% of revenue locked in avoidable disputes.

• Order smoothing to protect cash velocity: Order delays, redeliveries and weather‑driven disruptions can add three to five days to DSO. AI‑guided order smoothing uses supply, logistics, trading and weather‑forecast signals to reduce churn and prevent credit blocks before they occur.

• Customer‑to‑cash integrity: Reduced friction, improved customer experience (CX): Most CX challenges in oil and gas are billing‑integrity issues. Harmonizing pricing, rebate logic, uplift data and tax rules, supported by AI‑driven dispute classification and self‑service portals, can reduce disputes by 20% to 30% and materially speed up payment behavior.

• Platform integration for real‑time cash intelligence: Disconnected ERP, terminal, trading, POS and billing systems cause reconciliation gaps, uplift mismatches and billing errors. Standardized integration across these platforms unlocks real‑time visibility and can shorten billing cycles by two to seven days.

• A CFO-CIO‑led operating model shift: Siloed ownership across credit, logistics, billing and disputes slows decisions and increases leakage. Leading operators are now moving to centralized OTC control towers, shared KPIs and digitally enforced rulebooks, creating faster resolution cycles and predictable cash outcomes. When fully orchestrated, these levers form a self‑correcting cash engine that identifies risks early, prevents downstream issues and accelerates cash flow end‑to‑end.

What leaders are doing differently

Top‑quartile performers share three traits:

• Integrated data across ERP, CRM, trading and OTC systems

• Predictive, AI‑enabled workflows that prevent issues rather than respond to them

• CFO-CIO joint governance with KPIs tied to cash velocity, accuracy and customer outcomes

These companies achieve DSO in the 25 to 35-day range, disputes below 2% of receivables and cash conversion cycles of –10 days to –30 days.

The path forward

For oil and gas leaders, internal liquidity is becoming the most reliable source of funding for transition, digital transformation and long‑cycle capital programs.

CFOs and CIOs starting this journey are focusing on three immediate actions:

• Diagnose where cash is trapped, across all five levers

• Pilot targeted AI capabilities (e.g., cash application or dispute prediction) to demonstrate value within 90 days

• Establish a cash command center for real‑time issue detection and coordinated decision-making

The companies that move now will be best positioned to strengthen resilience, withstand volatility and fund their energy transition from within.

Access the full white paper – ‘Is AI the fuel oil and gas needs?’ including detailed frameworks, industry case studies and maturity benchmarks here.

Contributors

• Avinash Vishnu, Director, Business Consulting, EY India

• Rahul Dutta Gupta, Senior Manager, Business Consulting, EY India

• Hardik Nawale, Senior, Business Consulting, EY India

Summary 

AI-enabled finance helps oil and gas companies unlock trapped liquidity, reduce Days Sales Outstanding (DSO), resolve disputes and accelerate cash flow across volatile markets. Five integrated levers — AI credit decisions, order smoothing, customer-to-cash integrity leading to better customer experience (CX), platform integration and CFO-CIO governance — create a self-correcting cash engine. Agentic AI drives autonomous cash orchestration, preventing blocks, correcting billing issues early and enabling faster collections and real-time cash visibility.