Agentic AI may require regulatory reform, BOE’s Breeden says


FILE PHOTO: Sarah Breeden, Deputy Governor of the Bank of England gestures as she speaks at the Bank of England Stability Report, in London, Wednesday, July 9, 2025. Alastair Grant/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

LONDON, June 30 (Reuters) - ⁠More sophisticated regulatory frameworks may be needed ⁠to monitor and contain the risks ‌AI poses to the financial system, one of the Bank of England's deputy governors said on Tuesday.

Speaking at the ​European Central Bank Forum on ⁠central banking in ⁠Portugal, Sarah Breeden, deputy governor for financial stability, said ⁠the ‌rapid rise in capabilities of AI agents that can act autonomouslyhad exposed ⁠potential gaps.

"Our frameworks were not built ​to contemplate ‌autonomous agents, and relying on a human in ⁠the ​loop for all agent actions is unlikely to be realistic. More sophisticated governance and accountability frameworks ⁠may be needed," Breeden said.

Regulators ​and global standard-setting bodies have repeatedly warned about the risks posed by the rollout of AI ⁠across the financial sector since Anthropic released Mythos that could pose significant cybersecurity challenges to the banking industry, analysts say.

The Financial Stability Board ​earlier in June called for ⁠tighter safeguards to guard against the risks of ​AI agents, which, it ‌said, posed a distinct challenge ​to human oversight.

(Reporting by Phoebe Seers; Editing by Sharon Singleton and Barbara Lewis)

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