Artificial Intelligence in Financial Services and Investment Activity: Evidence on Adoption, Performance, and Systemic Risk (Central Asian Journal of Innovations on Tourism Management and Finance)

Summary

• The report analyzes AI adoption across 628 respondent organizations, including 203 fintechs, 149 traditional financial institutions, 146 AI vendors, and 130 regulators across 151 jurisdictions.p.6
• While 81% of surveyed financial services firms adopt AI, only 14% view AI as transformational to their organizational strategy and competitive advantage.p.7
• Fintechs lead traditional financial institutions in advanced AI adoption maturity by 47% to 30%, and in reaching the Transforming stage by 19% to 6%.p.7
• Deployment remains concentrated in internal back-office functions such as process automation (79%), data visualization (75%), and software engineering (75%).p.7
• Regarding cloud infrastructure, Amazon Web Services leads industry (46%) and vendors (55%), while 46% of regulators report using no cloud infrastructure at all.p.8
• 62% of organizations spending more than USD 100,000 annually on AI have reached advanced adoption maturity, compared to lower-spending peers.p.8

Key insights

1. A total of 81% of financial services institutions report adopting AI, but only 14% perceive it as transformational to their business strategy.p.7
2. Fintech firms outperform incumbents in advanced AI adoption (47% versus 30%) and in reaching a transforming state of adoption (19% versus 6%).p.7
3. Classical machine learning (75%) and generative AI (71%) are the most actively adopted AI categories among surveyed industry participants.p.7
4. 53% of surveyed industry respondents spend under USD 100,000 annually on AI while reporting maturity in GenAI and agentic AI.p.7
5. 46% of regulatory authorities report using no cloud infrastructure, with 24% not using any foundation models.p.8
6. Measuring the financial value of AI remains a struggle for 55% of industry respondents and 76% of large financial institutions.p.8
7. Data privacy and protection is rated as a top risk by 65% of vendors, 74% of industry firms, and 80% of regulators.p.9
8. 79% of regulators rate explainability as critical or important, yet 50% of industry firms have adopted explainable AI methods.p.10
9. 24% of industry respondents expect a net reduction in job roles due to AI, compared to 10% expecting a net increase.p.10
10. 69% of institutions responding to foundation model questions use OpenAI foundation models, creating potential concentration risk.p.53