Buch urges strong governance as 90 percent of banks adopt AI
ECB Supervisory Board Chair Claudia Buch urged banks to strengthen governance and IT resilience as more than 90 percent adopt artificial intelligence. Speaking in Amsterdam on September 22, 2026, Buch emphasized that supervisors are technology-neutral but not risk-neutral.
From automation to systemic exposure
More than 90 percent of banks under direct European Central Bank supervision integrate artificial intelligence into operations, with 85 percent utilizing generative AI.
Supervisory data show that 64 percent deploy AI for fraud and cybercrime prevention, while over 80 percent view automation as a tool to cut costs.
Banks allocate an average of 2.8 percent of operating income to digital transformation, representing roughly one-fifth of their IT budgets.
However, around two-thirds of euro area banks rely on external cloud providers, often based outside the European Union.
Buch stressed that new tools cannot compensate for fragmented legacy IT and weak risk data aggregation.
Tokenisation and central bank anchors
Around 30 percent of supervised banks plan to tokenise deposits, while 20 percent intend to issue e-money tokens.
To maintain settlement in central bank money, the Eurosystem launched its Pontes initiative and targets an integrated blueprint under Appia by 2028.
Payment services generate 28 percent of bank fee income, facing competition from more than 700 payment institutions in the euro area.
Buch noted that stablecoins are “unlikely to crowd out deposits” given the public safety net protecting banks.
Governance cannot be automated
Buch rightly reminds executives that algorithms cannot substitute for board accountability or fix decayed legacy systems.
Supervisors appropriately target cross-bank cloud dependencies before systemic vulnerabilities materialize.
True resilience requires institutions to fund IT infrastructure instead of chasing short-term payouts.