The EIMF Live Online Learning Experience

Participants will receive access to the recorded sessions of the course.

EIMF subject-matter experts deliver engaging and interactive courses across a broad spectrum of areas, that can be enjoyed in the comfort of your own chosen environment. Read more

Course Overview

AI is rapidly transforming the global financial services industry, with the potential to disrupt and refine the existing nature of the industry. This is affecting, in particular, the banking, fund and insurance sectors, with the Economists Intelligence Unit analysis showing that some 86% of the industry plans to increase AI-related investment into technology by 2025.

From trading stocks to assessment of mortgages and from equity and bond research support to conducting AML controls, AI is poised to be a major productivity boost to the entire financial services industry. McKinsey estimates that Gen AI will improve productivity in core bank activities by 30 to 90% and cumulatively, productivity and other benefits would add 9 to 15% of banks operating profits.

AI, however, is increasingly recognised, notably in the EU, as having the potential to introduce or worsen risk exposures. Unintended bias or discrimination against certain groups of consumers is a heightened risk. Regulators fret about such risks translating into financial exposures for firms or if they give rise to large-scale operational risks, such as malicious actions by cyber-criminals injecting false data into LLMs, or hallucinations and deepfakes using realistic AI-generated audio, video images impersonations.

Whilst the major world economies are pursuing divergent regulatory approaches to governing AI in the financial sector, and beyond, the EU has embarked on the world’s first initiative and highly distinctive framework for regulating AI – focusing on the risks of usage rather than applications. It is setting the de facto international standard. Further, the EU AI requirements apply to all 3rd country AI platforms used in the EU.

The scope is very comprehensive, and embraces:

• Creators of AI models liable for how the technology is used – even when a 3rd-party embeds it in a different system
• Scope: AI creators, service-providers, deployers, importers, distributors, and product manufacturers – but not users
• AI Act requires 3rd-country providers/creators of AI systems to appoint an authorized representative established in the EU

Focus of the course content

This course in the EU AI Act will cover all the relevant regulatory aspects from a creator or originator perspective to ensure that banks, insurers and fund managers are fully compliant with the detailed rules of the Act.

Central to the EU AI regulatory agenda in this course is the identification of key risks associated with the adoption of AI by originators, with huge implications for banks, insurers, fund managers, brokers, traders, intermediaries and third-party licensees using the AI application.

The AI Act’s regulatory framework defines four levels of risk for AI systems: unacceptable, high, limited, and minimal or no risk. Systems posing unacceptable risks, such as threatening people’s safety, livelihood, and right, are banned. But high-risk AI systems in the financial services sector will be subject to robust pre-assessment, such as credit and social scoring models and evaluation by banks of creditworthiness of natural persons in loan origination and decisioning

The first obligations under the Act became applicable from 2 February 2025. Providers and deployers of AI systems must now ensure that their employees and contractors using AI have an adequate degree of AI literacy, for example by implementing training.

The course will also cover the recently-issued General-Purpose AI Code of Practice received by the EU Commission for application to providers of general-purpose AI models and general-purpose AI models with systemic risks. The Code includes transparency and copyright-related rules. For models that may carry systemic risks, providers are required to assess and mitigate these risks before introducing them into the EU marketplace.

The AI Act rules on general-purpose AI apply from 2 August 2025. The EC-housed AI Office is facilitating the drawing-up of a Code of Practice to detail out these rules. The Code should represent a central tool for providers to demonstrate compliance with the AI Act, incorporating state-of-the-art practices.