Asset servicing veteran offers typically punchy views on the challenges facing the market

A 36 minute watch.

The latest voice to feature in our Building Better Financial Service Expo is David Moffat, chief proposition officer at SS&C Technologies, which offers investor servicing to about half the UK funds market.

Speaking candidly to Sam Shaw , he shares views on the rise of tech and its role in security: “I’m not seeing [biometrics taking off] anytime soon..”

David says providers must show differentiation in today’s fairly homogenous world and warns over the risks of bias with AI models when used for KYC AML checking, for instance.

“How do you bring in human override when you’ve got nothing that backs up why a decision was made in the first place?”

That said, he also believes if we could get AI engines that can deliver high-quality financial advice, “and I don’t mean robotics that basically go through a numpty 20-question risk assessment” it could overhaul “the delivery of financial advice to the mass market that the financial advice community has – post-RDR – largely walked away from.”

David shares his scepticism over the revolutionary power of blockchain, though suggests it could help introduce liquidity in vehicles like the forthcoming Long-Term Asset Fund and does help to solve concerns over the legal trust framework in a trading environment.

“You could see blockchain start creating synthetic liquidity around those vehicles which are not liquid in the ‘normal’ sense, creating secondary markets. That’s where a blockchain model would actually make every logical sense amongst a closed group of institutional providers.”

We also cover operational resilience, GDPR and David’s post-Brexit view of financial regulation, as he questions whether an outcomes-focused FCA will lead to it taking a retrospective approach.