A significant number of executives from 151 financial institutions in 33 countries say they expect to become mass adopters of AI within the next two years, and that AI will become an essential business driver across the financial industry. To capitalise on data from new digitally driven channels, financial services firms are increasing their use of AI and machine learning. According to a research report, 86% of Financial Services executives intend to increase their AI-related investments through 2025.
With this, the Singapore government’s Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) launched the Global Veritas Challenge to promote the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) solutions in the financial sector, it said on Monday in a statement.
The challenge aims to accelerate the development of Artificial Intelligence and data analytics solutions that adhere to the Veritas framework’s fairness, ethics, accountability, and transparency (FEAT) principles. The FEAT principles were developed in 2018 by MAS and the financial industry to strengthen internal governance around the use of AI and data management and use.
AI solutions that are validated against the Feat principles strengthen trust in AI technologies among users and the public, said chief fintech officer of MAS. “This trust underpins all our AI development efforts and is vital to realising Singapore’s ambition as a global hub for AI in the financial sector,” he added.
Fintech firms, solution providers and financial institutions around the world are invited to submit innovative solutions to address eight problem statements identified by banks.
The challenge, supported by a leading global professional services company, invites fintech companies, solution providers, and financial institutions from around the world to submit solutions for problem statements aimed at validating the fairness of AI solutions. Banks identified these statements in product marketing, risk, compliance, and fraud monitoring, loan origination and know-your-customer, and credit scoring. and profiling.
Correspondingly, the Monetary Authority of Singapore announced last year that it had developed “fairness metrics” for AI adoption in finance. The regulator is working with a consortium of financial firms to develop the metrics as part of the first phase of its Veritas initiative, which aims to promote responsible use of artificial intelligence (AI) in financial services.
This metric aims to recommend “the right product to the right customer at the right time”, as the MAS acknowledges the increasing scope of artificial intelligence as a tool to analyse customer data and match it with products or services.
Managing director of the global professional service company applied intelligence lead for South-east Asia, said that while many C-suite executives believe that AI is key leverage to achieve growth objectives, “leaders must also understand the potential ethical and socio-technical implications and take steps to mitigate the risks and challenges that may arise” when incorporating AI into their business.
This year’s AI projects in pilot and production are aimed at increasing revenue potential by removing cost and time constraints. This year, a greater emphasis will be placed on customer and stakeholder satisfaction by launching new digital channels and getting the customer experience right the first time.
Cost constraints are currently slowing AI adoption more than any other factor. The second and third reasons for not implementing AI more broadly across an organisation are a lack of infrastructure and poor data quality. An economist research team found that 86% of Financial Service’s executives plan to increase AI-related investment into technology over the next five years globally, with the strongest views expressed in APAC (90%) and North America (89%). Investment in AI technologies could help resolve issues of legacy systems that have proved, along with systemic upgrades, a costly constraint financial services firms have had to deal with for decades.
