Artificial intelligence (AI) has now closely matched or even surpassed humans in what were previously considered unattainable areas. These include chess, arcade games, Go, self-driving cars, protein folding and much more. This rapid technological progress has also had a huge impact on the financial services industry. More and more CEOs in the sector declare (explicitly or implicitly) that they run "technology companies with a banking license". You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, here.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has now closely matched or even surpassed humans in what were previously considered unattainable areas. These include chess, arcade games, Go, self-driving cars, protein folding, and much more. This rapid technological progress has also had a huge impact on the financial services industry. More and more CEOs in the sector declare (explicitly or implicitly) that they run "technology companies with a banking license". There is also a rapid emergence and growth of the financial technology industry (fintech), where technology startups increasingly challenge established financial institutions in areas such as retail banking, pensions.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has now closely matched or even surpassed humans in what were previously considered unattainable areas. These include chess, arcade games, Go, self-driving cars, protein folding and much more. This rapid technological progress has also had a huge impact on the financial services industry. More and more CEOs in the sector declare (explicitly or implicitly) that they run "technology companies with a banking license". There is also a rapid emergence and growth of the financial technology industry (FinTech), where technology startups increasingly challenge established financial institutions in areas such as retail banking, pensions or personal investments.

Get the Deloitte Insights app. Since February 2020, there has been a dramatic shift in the operating environment of financial markets, with increased volatility, repricing of assets, and transitions of favored asset classes. Uncertainty abounds for investment managers. According to one hypothetical stress scenario, individual managers may have seen assets under management fluctuate by up to one-third in the United States as outflows and valuation changes have affected many during the pandemic.1 Even before the emergence of COVID-19, the situation for investment managers appeared ripe for change.

Although the average consumer may not be familiar with the concept of machine learning, it's already a big part of our daily lives. Tom Schlebusch, the co-founder and chief executive of NMRQL Research, a local fintech player offering South Africa's first machine-learning-powered unit trust fund, says machine learning has a big role to play in how we invest our money. Amid the explosion of data and the exponential advancement of technology, investors are beginning to realise the benefits of machine learning in investment management. Schlebusch says that, when Amazon or Netflix makes recommendations that appeal to us, it's because machine learning was used to analyse our behaviour. "All social media platforms use machine learning to provide personalised feedback based on behaviour patterns and relationships with other users.