If you’ve been paying attention to investment markets over the last couple of years, you’ll already know that AI is one of the most significant forces reshaping the global economy. The returns from semiconductor companies, cloud infrastructure, and the businesses building and running AI systems have been remarkable — and the broader implications are only just beginning to play out.
I was in London recently for an industry conference, and the keynote session on AI was arguably the most discussed moment of the whole event. Not because the topic was new to anyone in the room — we’ve all been watching this unfold — but because of how quickly it’s now moving inside financial planning firms specifically. The framing that stuck with me: this isn’t just another software upgrade. It’s closer to an industrial revolution. The shift from paper-based advice to digital systems in the 1990s took a decade. What’s happening now is moving at a fraction of that pace.