CompaniesFinancial ServicesAWSPrint articleJamie SimonSep 19, 2025 – 9.05amSaveLog inorSubscribeto save articleShareCopy linkCopiedEmailLinkedInTwitterFacebookCopy linkCopiedShare via...Gift this articleSubscribe to gift this articleGift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe.Subscribe nowAlready a subscriber?LoginThis Industry Insight is produced in commercial partnership with AWS.The financial services sector is undergoing a major structural reinvention, powered by the promise of generative (and agentic) artificial intelligence (AI). The technology is already changing how financial institutions – from banks to insurers, traders, and superannuation funds – operate. We’re seeing AI redesign how Australia’s leading institutions serve customers and employees, by anticipating needs, automating processes, increasing productivity, and accelerating delivery.At Amazon Web Services, we are seeing agentic AI emerge as the next profound step of AI technology. Where generative AI operates within defined context – producing text, images, or code in response to a prompt – agentic AI operates on a different sphere.Jamie Simon, director of financial services, Australia and New Zealand, Amazon Web Services (AWS).It is outcome-driven and can autonomously reason, act and adapt in pursuit of an outcome, taking a sequence of actions with minimal human intervention. For example, while AI can monitor transactions for potential fraud, agentic AI takes it further, with agents able to act, and engage with customers to investigate suspicious activities and prevent scams before they occur.Agents are streamlining insurance claims processing by interpreting, deciding and acting on damage assessment and document verification, fraud detection and claims approval. They are orchestrating the entire mortgage workflow from assessment to underwriting, approving and even loan processing.AdvertisementAs with most nascent technologies, scaling agentic capabilities safely and securely is a key challenge. Experimenting with small, well-defined use cases are relatively straightforward. Deploying agents across an entire workflow, let alone a regulated enterprise, at scale, is far more complex. Clear AI governance, agent guardrails, real-time system observability, and the ability to monitor interactions needing human intervention when required are essential.Agentic AI will also revolutionise personalisation based on an individual’s profile, behaviour, and goals. For example, insurance can be priced for a specific risk profile; wealth advice tailored in real time to changing circumstances; or mortgages approved in seconds as the applicant’s data flows securely and automatically between banking systems.The benefits are early, but they are tangible. Eightcap have deployed a multi-agent system to better manage infrastructure and security, reducing the time to investigate and resolve incidents by 94 per cent at 1/100th the cost. The agents sift through records, add context, and build a clear picture of what happened, all concurrently in a way humans cannot. Lendi Group have launched Australia’s first agentic, AI-powered home loan and property companion – Lendi Guardian. Guardian will provide customers with 24/7 rate radar, one-tap refinance journeys, pre-filled forms, anticipating – not just responding to customers’ needs.As agentic AI reshapes the financial services landscape, one of its true potentials lies in elevating people to be able to achieve more, not at the task level, but at the system level. It will free employees from repetitive tasks to give them more time to tackle more differentiated tasks. Importantly, while agents work from patterns in historical data, humans are still required to empathise with customers, understand unspoken needs and use that insight and intuition to steer the system design and overall direction.As we have always seen, technology alone won’t get us there. It is a whole business transformation and commitment. The board and C-suite cannot delegate AI ownership to just the CIO/CTO and IT departments. They also need to understand its capabilities, risks and strategic implications across the organisation and its many stakeholders. The fastest-moving organisations are those where business and technology leaders work together, aligning AI deployment with customer and growth strategies from the outset.We are at a remarkable moment in time, our customers have achieved so much in the past few years building the capabilities to deploy generative AI, setting up for the next few years which will see a fundamental shift in market dynamics and competition.By its nature innovation will involve taking risks and everybody will make mistakes. But balancing and managing that risk with the recognition that speed and progress are also important will be key. Those that manage this balance well will build sustainable competitive advantage and they will be the leaders that redefine financial services for all.Jamie Simon is director of financial services, Australia and New Zealand, Amazon Web Services (AWS).SponsoredbyAWSThis content has been funded by an advertiser and written by the Nine commercial editorial team.SaveLog inorSubscribeto save articleShareCopy linkCopiedEmailLinkedInTwitterFacebookCopy linkCopiedShare via...Gift this articleSubscribe to gift this articleGift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe.Subscribe nowAlready a subscriber?LoginLicense articleFollow the topics, people and companies that matter to you.Find out moreRead MoreFetching latest articlesThe inside story of Australia’s world-first social media banSam Buckingham-JonesThe most powerful people in consulting in 2025Australia’s most powerful deal makers in 2025Here’s how to really handle a toxic bossRachael BoltonWhy this CEO asks job candidates to describe their desk to himWhy this CEO left private equity to run a beauty retailerThe world’s most coveted car – worth $75m – is shifting gearsTony DavisThe hypercars battling it out to be crowned the world’s fastestGet lost at sea with these 5 page-turnersNicola Forrest spotted with new boyfriend in EuropeHannah WoottonMacquarie-backed seaweed group enlists Japanese giant, eyes IPOA new twist in the billionaire Wright family feud