NatWest CEO Paul Thwaite said AI will take over some existing roles. JPMorgan's Dimon and Deutsche Bank's Roux agree. The shift compresses costs but could create regulatory friction.
NatWest CEO Paul Thwaite said artificial intelligence will take over some existing banking roles, though he stopped short of saying whether that means a smaller headcount overall. Speaking at a business summit hosted by The Times, Thwaite said: "In effect there will be roles that currently exist that absolutely to all intents and purposes [will be] delivered by AI."
The Daily Mail added that NatWest has been hiring more software and AI specialists even as it reshapes its workforce. Thwaite is not alone in predicting job displacement. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said in May the bank may eventually hire more AI experts than bankers. "I think it will reduce our jobs down the road," Dimon said. "There will be all different types of jobs, and I think we will be hiring more AI people and fewer bankers in certain categories, and it will make them more productive."
Deutsche Bank's investment bank chief information officer, Denis Roux, said Thursday that AI has cut some task completion times from two years to three months. Roux added that Deutsche Bank uses simpler models for routine work, is cautious about deploying AI for everything, and is developing tools to automate financial data extraction and link external events to the bank's portfolio for exposure gauging.
The PYMNTS Intelligence report "Financial Services Pulls Ahead in the Enterprise AI Race" found that 85% of financial services and insurance firms with at least $1 billion in revenue plan to increase AI budgets over the next year. The most adopted AI tasks are revenue recognition and accounting close (65% of firms), credit risk assessment and scoring (60%), and sales forecasting and pipeline optimization (60%). Those are structured, auditable back-office functions that customers never see, the report said.
A separate Nvidia report from June said nearly 90% of financial institutions are deploying or assessing AI, with 65% already using it.
For investors, the shift cuts two ways. AI can compress cost bases, which improves return on equity. JPMorgan Chase carries an Alpha Score of 63 on the JPM stock page, reflecting moderate risk amid those efficiency bets. Headcount reductions can create regulatory friction, especially in the UK where the government still holds a stake in NatWest. The bank's next quarterly earnings, expected in July, may offer the first concrete view of how AI investment affects its cost-to-income ratio.
Thwaite's remark is the plainest acknowledgment yet from a major UK bank that AI is a replacement tool, not just an assistant. The question for investors is whether revenue growth keeps pace with the savings.
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