Asia Pacific lenders turn to AI to strengthen compliance efforts

Oracle’s clients achieved 70% productivity gains as AI improved compliance efficiency.

LAS VEGAS — Across Asia Pacific’s financial sector, artificial intelligence (AI) is making its biggest impact in fighting financial crime and improving compliance, said Sovan Shatpathy, senior vice president for Product Management and Development for Financial Services at Oracle.

“Financial crime and compliance is like a match made in heaven these days for AI,” Shatpathy told Asian Business Review on the sidelines of Oracle AI World 2025 in Las Vegas, adding that banks are using the technology to be more proactive rather than reactive in tackling financial threats.

According to Shatpathy, Oracle’s banking clients have reported productivity gains of 70% or more through AI-driven automation and analytics, allowing investigators to focus on higher-value work while proactively preventing fraud and ensuring compliance.

Beyond financial crime prevention, banks are increasingly deploying AI in retail and corporate banking operations.

“It’s almost like, how do you infuse AI into every step of our day-to-day money management?” he said.

Banks are also turning to AI for risk management, including stress testing and scenario modelling to ensure portfolios perform as expected during market disruptions.

Other growing use cases include cash forecasting, liquidity management, and account rebalancing.

“In Asia Pacific, there is a big nucleus of focus on domains like trade finance,” Shatpathy said.

“There are big corridors of trade going through Dubai and Singapore, and many other big cities. We are seeing a lot of traction in trade finance use cases with AI — how you move money, how the guarantor or both sides are delivering value.”