3CL Seminar: 'Artificial Intelligence and the future of financial stability: regulatory and supervisory gaps in the UK framework'

Speaker: Dr Clara Martins Pereira (Associate Professor of Financial Law, University of Durham)

Abstract: The increasing use of AI in finance is predicted to have mixed impact on financial stability: while AI can be used to help financial institutions and supervisors identify, manage, and monitor systemic risk, it can also increase the frequency and severity of crises by exacerbating existing vulnerability channels. Under the UK’s technology-agnostic approach to AI, algorithmic technologies are primarily governed through existing sectoral frameworks rather than bespoke regulation. I argue that this approach might be insufficient to mitigate their negative impact on financial stability. The features that separate AI from other technologies—opacity, autonomy, and adaptability—make existing regulatory frameworks and architectures a poor fit for tackling the financial systemic risk created by AI. Disclosure rules are undermined by ‘black box’ opacity and the unpredictability of autonomous algorithm-algorithm interactions, while ex-ante testing struggles to predict endogenous risks arising from those interactions and their systemic impact. Crucially, model risk management and operational resilience frameworks, often calibrated for acute disruptions and focused on individual firms, are ill-equipped to ensure systemic resilience when AI models drift in similar ways. The article concludes that mitigating the risks of AI for financial stability calls for a purposeful change towards specialised algorithmic governance rules, and a review of supervision and enforcement practices.

Dr Clara Martins Pereira is Associate Professor of Financial Law and Director for International Development at Durham Law School, Invited Professor at Católica Lisbon School of Law, and Global Associate Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame. Her research focuses on financial law and regulation, technological innovation, and sustainable development. Clara holds a DPhil, MPhil, and Magister Juris from the University of Oxford, as well as an MSc in Law and Business and an LLB from Católica Lisbon. She has held academic roles at King’s College London, the University of Oxford, and the LSE, and served as a Visiting Scholar at Columbia Law School, Sapienza University of Rome, and the Max Planck Institute, among others. Formerly a capital markets lawyer at PLMJ, she has also acted as a consultant for organisations such as the World Bank and ICF.

3CL runs the 3CL Travers Smith Lunchtime Seminar Series, featuring leading academics from the Faculty, and high-profile practitioners.

All seminars take place in B16 in person from 1pm to 2pm if not indicated otherwise. A sandwich lunch is available for all participants from 12:30pm just outside of B16.

Enquiries to: 3cl@law.cam.ac.uk