Auditing in the Twin Transition Era: Between Professional Judgment, Sustainability Assurance, and Agentic AI – Challenges and Future Directions

This study investigates how the convergence between digital transformation and the sustainability transition – commonly referred to as the Twin Transition – is reshaping financial auditing in the context of emerging autonomous technologies such as Agentic AI. An exploratory qualitative approach is adopted, combining reflexive thematic analysis of the academic literature, evaluation of the regulatory framework (CSRD, ESRS, ISA), and synthesis of the relationships between the digital dimension, the sustainability dimension, and the auditor’s professional judgment. Findings highlight that integrating Agentic AI, Blockchain (BT), Big Data Analytics (BDA), and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) into audit engagements can deliver substantial benefits, including continuous auditing, ESG data traceability, and operational efficiency. However, these developments also raise challenges such as algorithmic opacity, data bias, and the lack of adapted standards. The paper proposes a conceptual framework for integrated financial auditing, where professional judgment remains the central decisionmaking node, complemented by the predictive and adaptive capacities of emerging technologies. Finally, the study outlines avenues for future research on algorithmic auditing, standardization of sustainability assurance, and the development of hybrid auditor competencies, contributing to both the theoretical and practical foundations of auditing in the Twin Transition era.