By Angus MacNee
In the financial services sector, most applications of AI are seeking to enhance existing processes to create efficiency, and the adoption curve is already steep. Recent joint research by the Bank of England and the FCA found that 75 % of UK financial services firms are using AI, up from 58 % just two years ago.
Regulators are also signaling a clear tech-positive stance. In January, the FCA convened 115 experts for its first AI Sprint to help shape a principles-based framework. Then in April, it proposed a live AI testing service, giving firms a regulatory sandbox for consumer-facing models ahead of a planned launch in September 2025. Most notably, the FCA has chosen not to impose prescriptive AI rules, instead stating that existing accountability regimes and outcomes-based regulation remain sufficient as the technology continues to evolve. This represents a clear alignment of regulatory priorities and technological capability.
Yet, most IFA firms utilising AI are doing so tactically – report drafting, call transcriptions, CRM data-entry, etc. And while adoption and the overall impact is clearly advantageous, treating AI as a bolt-on efficiency tool misses the longer-term strategic opportunity, a bit like businesses from the 1990s thinking a brochure‐ware website was “going digital”. Why? Because there is a larger transformation underway where, in the future, AI agents will become the primary way in which firms, clients, and stakeholders interact. This marks a fundamental shift from traditional human-driven workflows to AI-driven services or, in other words, a shift from human-first to AI-first interactions.
Now, despite the progress of AI advancement and the scale of opportunity it promises, the transition to AI-first won’t happen overnight. However, if nationals and networks (and by extension advisers) are to unlock and benefit from the true disruption – and promise – of AI, they will need to not only adopt AI but architect their business around AI.
What does this mean? It means having a cohesive strategy that considers technology interoperability, data sovereignty and AI, and its application to specific business use-cases. For example, advisers have historically treated data capture as admin rather than an asset and opportunity. In an agentic world, every field – fact-find, ATR, portfolio information – must be accessible, easily searched and understood, and managed with clear consent protocols. Only then can AI agents reason over it to derive insight and actions, without the requirement for endless analogue to digital data transformation and back-and-forth communication.
This will require a mindset and commercial shift (as well as a technical shift) particularly where a conflict exists between vertically-integrated and antiquated business model and the value proposition that is in the clients’ best interests.
This conflict is further amplified by AI favouring an independent financial advice model, when the goal is to optimise for better client outcomes, as restricted models will lack the product and solution range needed – and the usual commercial and compliance rationale for restricted propositions will no longer apply. This is a key point and one that we fundamentally believe at ValidPath: independent financial advice is the best framework to support positive client outcomes, and the only framework if you are striving for the best client outcomes in an AI-driven and AI-first world.
In short, integrating the odd meeting transcription tool into today’s workflow is not enough. You must architect your entire business so that AI agents can transact with your data, processes and people safely and at scale.
The internet rewired distribution. Platforms compressed fund costs. Consumer Duty raised the bar on outcomes. AI agents will combine all three effects at once, redefining how value is created and delivered in financial advice. The question, therefore, for every firm is blunt: Will your systems be fluent in this new lingua franca – or will they still require manual translation?
At Rimbal and ValidPath, we believe this isn’t just an opportunity – it’s a responsibility. Advisers and their agents will continue to play a vital role into the future, and those that architect their business for an AI-driven future will be able to support better client outcomes.
Embracing AI is not about replacing the human element, it is about enhancing it and over the longer-term shifting human effort from production to supervision. Those that do not plan for AI risk watching from the sidelines as the next generation of advisers, and their agents, take the field.
It is for these reasons that Rimbal will continue to invest in the essential AI-driven infrastructure for advisers, and why we are excited about the future of financial advice.
