FCA and ICO to host roundtable on opportunities for AI deployment in financial services

The FCA and ICO have written a joint letter on supporting AI, innovation and growth in the financial services industry.

The regulators acknowledge the importance of regulatory certainty around the use of technologies among growing opportunities for AI use within financial services, and note that respondents to a recent FCA and BoE survey identified data protection and the Consumer Duty to be in the top three regulatory constraints to AI deployment. Such results demonstrated a lack of confidence among some firms to develop and adopt AI, as well as potential uncertainty around the interactions between the ICO and the financial regulators’ regimes.

To develop understanding of these challenges, the FCA and ICO are hosting a roundtable with industry leaders on 9 May 2025. Stakeholders are invited to express their interest by 21 March 2025.

The roundtable is set to discuss:

• Broad areas of regulatory uncertainty and challenge faced in respect of AI adoption and wider innovation;
• How the ICO and FCA can work together with industry to provide greater regulatory certainty and support growth; and
• Specific areas of data protection and financial regulation in which greater regulatory support is needed to enhance firms’ ability to innovate and adopt new technologies