There’s a common misconception around the growing corporate demand for artificial intelligence (AI) in their financial services, according to ANZ’s Leigh Mahoney.
There’s no line around the block for businesses demanding AI as a concept, ANZ’s Managing Director, PCM Product & Digital Solutions told ANZ Institutional Insights. What businesses actually want is what they always have: outcomes.
“Customers don't want AI,” Mahoney said on podcast. “They're not asking for it.”
What they're asking for is the same as it’s always been, he said. Less manual work in their interactions around payments. Lower costs. Faster decisions. A better experience for their customers. And improved productivity.
“I think AI is simply the technology that helps deliver those outcomes,” he said. “AI by itself won't get you there.”
Mahoney spoke to Insights ahead of his attendance at the 2026 Sibos Financial Services conference in September, where the impact of AI on payments will be a central theme of discussion. You can listen to an edited version of his comments on podcast below.
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The advent of AI has not significantly altered the way payments work, Mahoney said – just how they are approached.
“It isn't that payments themselves are becoming intelligent,” he said. “It's [that] decisions around payments are becoming more intelligent.
“For years [the sector has] invested in digitising transactions, and now we're starting to think about how we digitise decision making.”
ANZ has watched its customers move past the experimentation stage with the technology, Mahoney said, and toward practical questions like how it can help forecast cashflows and reduce reconciliation.
AI, and the invisible infrastructure that delivers those outcomes, are “increasingly becoming part of that answer”, he said.
The balance
With the opportunity of AI, however, comes risk. While banks are using AI to detect fraud and strengthen controls, according to Mahoney, many criminals have access to the same technology.
“I think AI is helping make payments safer,” he said. “But [it is also] helping make fraud more sophisticated.”
The challenge for the industry, Mahoney said, was finding the right balance between speed, convenience and security in payments.
“Customers shouldn't have to choose,” he said.
Part of the solution is education, which remains “one of the strongest security controls available”, Mahoney said.
“Awareness matters,” he said. “Good digital hygiene matters. And I think banks have a really important role in helping our customers understand those new risks as well.”
Sibos time is here again. On September 28, the world’s premier financial services conference will bring the best minds in payments together in one place: Miami, USA.
ANZ experts will be among 8,000 expected attendees sharing the newest ideas and trends that will shape the future of payments, banking and beyond.
In the lead up to the event, ANZ Institutional will bring you insights from offer unique insight into the future of the industry. You can read more here.
As technology changes the thinking around payments, the most important things a bank can provide will remain the same, according to Mahoney: trust, judgement, and doing the right thing.
“No matter how much technology evolves, the fundamentals don't change,” he said. “Payments run on trust. Banking runs on trust. AI will only be successful if it strengthens the trust.”
But like with security, finding success with AI within an organisation will be about striking a balance.
“The winners won't be the organizations that have the most AI,” he said. “The winners will be the organizations that best combine AI, trusted data, and human judgment.”
In many ways the pertinent question for business is where to keep humans in place - around judgment, ethics, and accountability, among other things.
“Because humans in the loop are really, really important,” he said. “People trust humans. That's where the trust will come from.”
