The double-edged sword of Artificial Intelligence

In 1942, science fiction author Isaac Asimov introduced the world to his three laws of robotics. In LinkedIn's Financial Services/Fintech survey of more than 1,000 professionals from the broader FI/Fintech space, it is clear that the threats and opportunities associated with A.I. have never been more present conceptually than they are today. When you look at some of the organizations making big bets on A.I. today, the online lists always include technology majors, but we don't yet see banks investing anywhere near the scale of Microsoft, Google, Apple, Alibaba, Baidu and others. Industrial players like Boeing and Tesla are making big bets on A.I., so it is reasonable to expect that we should see big investments coming through financial services also. However, right now the lion's share of progress appears to be coming from players like Ant Financial and smaller Fintech's who are able to specialize in various technologies. In LinkedIn's recent Financial Services Insights Survey, Fintech professionals (63%) and investment bankers (55%) were the most interested in machine learning and A.I.-based investing as key technologies worth watching.