Citigroup Inc said artificial intelligence is likely to displace more jobs across the banking industry than in any other sector as the technology is poised to upend consumer finance and makes workers more productive.

About 54% of jobs across banking have a high potential to be automated, the bank said Wednesday in a new report on AI. An additional 12% of roles across the industry could be augmented with the technology, Citigroup found.

The world’s biggest banks have slowly begun experimenting more with AI over the last year, spurred by the promise that it will help them boost staffers’ productivity and cut costs.

At Citigroup, for instance, the firm has said it would equip its 40,000 coders with the ability to experiment with different AI technologies, and the company has said it’s used generative AI, which can produce sentences, essays or poetry based on a user’s simple questions or commands, to quickly comb through hundreds of pages of regulatory proposals.

JPMorgan Chase & Co is scooping up talent and chief executive officer Jamie Dimon has said he believes the technology will allow employers to shrink the workweek to just 3.5 days. Deutsche Bank AG is using artificial intelligence to scan wealthy-client portfolios. And ING Groep NV is screening for potential defaulters.

Generative AI “has the potential to revolutionise the banking industry and improve profitability,” David Griffiths, Citigroup’s chief technology officer, said in a statement accompanying the new report. “At Citi, we’re focused on implementing AI in a safe and responsible way to amplify the power of Citi and our people.”

Even if AI does replace some roles across the industry, Citigroup said, the technology might not lead to a drop in headcount. Financial firms will likely need to hire a bevy of AI managers and AI-focused compliance officers to help them ensure their use of the technology is in line with regulations.

Plus, new technologies haven’t always led to job cuts. In one example Citigroup offered, the number of human tellers soared between the 1970s and mid-2000s even after the introduction of automated teller machines.

  - Bloomberg