New council launches to tackle AI agent oversight in financial services

AI fintech, Aveni, has announced the launch of its Agent Assurance Expert Council (AAEC), bringing together senior leaders from across financial services and advice, risk and compliance to tackle one of the most pressing challenges facing the industry: how to assure and govern the next generation of AI-driven agents. 

The first meeting took place in Edinburgh last night, with future rotating meetings planned between London and Scotland.

The AAEC has been established by Aveni as a collaborative forum to explore how assurance frameworks must evolve in response. With participation from senior industry practitioners, the council will focus on practical approaches to governing agentic systems, including emerging concepts such as machine-led assurance and the future of the lines of defence model.

Aveni says industry-wide collaboration will be critical to developing consistent, scalable approaches to monitoring, validating and evidencing AI-driven decisions within customer journeys.

It added: "As organisations move rapidly from AI tools that support decision-making to autonomous agents capable of complex interaction and taking action, traditional assurance models are being stretched beyond their limits. These systems introduce continuous, machine-led decision-making at scale — raising fundamental questions for boards, regulators and compliance leaders around oversight, accountability and customer outcome."

Industry research shows that 99% of firms plan to deploy AI agents, yet only a small proportion have the assurance frameworks in place to do so safely. As adoption accelerates, Aveni believes the gap between ambition and ensuring an appropriate level of oversight is becoming one of the defining risks for financial services.

Kent Mackenzie, regtech adviser at Aveni, commented: “AI agents represent a step change in how decisions are made within financial services. Assurance models and frameworks built for human-led processes are no longer sufficient. The Agent Assurance Expert Council is about bringing the industry together to define how we maintain control, transparency and trust as these systems scale. Collaboration will be essential to ensuring we meet regulatory expectations while continuing to innovate responsibly.”