Hundreds rush for AI jobs at ‘data led’ UK financial regulator

“Hundreds” of applicants have thrown their hats in the ring for senior AI jobs at the UK’s top financial regulator, according to the new hires’ future boss, despite the fact that AI companies can pay higher compensation.

Jessica Rusu, the Financial Conduct Authority’s chief data, information and artificial intelligence officer, said candidates valued the opportunity to solve “fascinating and interesting problems” at the FCA.

“We have two senior leadership roles in the market now, and we have had hundreds of really high-quality applications,” the executive, who spent more than 20 years in the private sector before joining the FCA in 2021, said in an interview.

The FCA has been advertising for a head of agentic AI and data science research, who will join the organization’s senior leadership team for a salary of between £140 000 and £190 000 ($186 000 and $253,000) in London, or £126 000 to £171 000 if they work from the watchdog’s Leeds or Edinburgh offices.

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The regulator is also hiring a head of department, AI and technology security operations within the same salary range. Both roles recently closed for applications.

It’s part of the FCA’s goal to become a global leader in AI regulation, both through its own use of the technology and its oversight of usage across the 35 500 firms it supervises.

Rusu told a Bloomberg event in London on Monday that the FCA was building AI tools to help oversee anti-money laundering controls at 60,000 extra firms, as part of a new duty that comes into effect from 2028. It’s also using automatic and agentic AI agents to help supervise around 9 000 small wholesale market transaction-reporting firms.

The FCA is monitoring the financial services industry’s use of AI and encouraging good practices. At the event, Rusu called for firms “to help consumers understand the limits of financial information and advice generated by their models through clear, proportionate and consistent disclaimers.”

The regulator is also working with firms on cyber defences and the potential risks from AI, as highlighted by the security concerns around Anthropic’s new Mythos model earlier this year.

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“AI is moving faster than any regulatory framework was designed,” Rusu said. “That means regulators will increasingly need to make judgments without precedent, while ensuring that trust remains at the heart of financial services.”

If the FCA had unlimited resources, Rusu said, “we would go after more and more financial crime.” The regulator is seeing a rise in AI-enabled fraud, such as deepfake videos encouraging fake investment opportunities, she added. “It really undermines growth.”

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