SINGAPORE – The rapidly evolving technology of generative artificial intelligence or Gen AI is unlikely to eliminate many banking jobs, but the nature of them will change.
The forecast comes from Mr Michael Abbott, global banking lead at consulting firm Accenture, who noted: “Banking is still going to be about relationships, trust and deposits.
“Gen AI will rewire how nearly every job in banking is run.”
But he also noted that an organisation still needs product experts in credit cards, mortgages and car loans, for example.
The challenge of AI is not as daunting as many may think, as Ms Emily Prince, group head of analytics at the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), noted.
Ms Prince, who spoke to The Straits Times here in March, said a worker does not have to be an expert in AI to use the technology, but will need to be curious and have “baseline mathematics, physics and engineering” knowledge, similar capabilities required of people in financial services now.
This is because the technology is freely available and, once it is deployed in an organisation, harnessing it boils down to an individual’s area of speciality, she added.
“Do you understand that business area? Do you understand the problem to be solved?”
She added that AI is being used in financial services to help workers perform operational tasks much more efficiently.
One example is in the area of financial compliance and know-your-customer (KYC) checks.
Fenergo, which provides financial compliance software, found that roughly 60 per cent of its customers in Singapore are abandoning their banking applications during the onboarding and KYC stage because of the onerous process.
Mr Cengiz Kiamil, its regional managing director, said AI can make it easier to identify and verify the identity of clients and the ultimate beneficial owners of a legal entity. It also automates document management so customers do not have to repeatedly give the same information.
Mr Kiamil added that Singapore is one of the most expensive countries in which to undertake KYC checks.
Some of the largest banks here employ anywhere between 500 and 2,000 compliance staff and spend on average US$300 million (S$384.5 million) a year on onboarding and KYC operations.
“It is definitely a large area to reap the benefits of AI,” Mr Kiamil said.
AI also has the potential to open up new revenue streams for financial institutions.
Accenture’s Mr Abbott noted that the best banks in the world are optimising the time saved from using AI and “putting it back into productivity time”.
They are holding conversations with their clients so that they can cross-sell or upsell to get more business from them, while driving “increased growth in the topline” in the meantime, he said.
Mr Abbott cited an insurance company that grew its business twofold after adopting Gen AI. The insurer could deal with only 20 per cent to 30 per cent of all its underwriting requests, but Gen AI did the necessary tasks, freeing underwriters to focus on value-added tasks.
This is an example of driving revenue and productivity without reducing headcount, Mr Abbott noted.
Mr Kiamil added that businesses can utilise AI to analyse the data of customers and better understand their preferences, and so tailor products and services to their needs. This creates opportunities to generate more revenue from each client.
AI is evolving so quickly that if there is a problem that might be too difficult or expensive for the technology to resolve today, the odds are that it is going to catch up six to 12 months down the road, noted Mr Abbott.
He envisions a time when AI will make experiences “infinitely more personal and better”.
“Eventually, chatbots will (make it) feel like you are texting your banker,” he said.
LSEG’s Ms Prince noted that AI will be the new normal, akin to how the world made the shift from pen and paper to computer. “We will all use it. It will become a norm.”
