Clients’ growing use of AI serves up opportunities for advisers

While clients are increasingly using AI to educate themselves on finance, this is increasing the need for financial advisers to contextualise or correct information, according to new research published by the Financial Planning Standards Board.

FPSB’s 2026 Impact of AI on Financial Planning global research found that a third (33 per cent) of clients are using AI for general financial education, while around a quarter (26 per cent) use it to to explore personalised financial scenarios or projections and a similar proportion (25 per cent) use it to validate or compare financial advice.

This finding supports ASIC’s and McCrindle’s findings that consumers are turning to AI for financial guidance. According to McCrindle 41 per cent of Australians trust AI to give financial advice.

But that is opening a window of opportunity for advisers. About one in five (21 per cent) are finding themselves correcting information AI has fed to their clients. It has also led to more collaborative discussions (19 per cent), and 16 per cent of advisers globally found it has strengthened their role as trusted professionals while only 6 per cent found it has decreased client engagement.

On the downside, 14 per cent of advisers report that the use of AI by clients has increased scepticism of professional advice.

“AI has the potential to expand access to financial planning and improve the ways financial planners serve their clients, but technology alone cannot replace the judgment, ethical responsibility and human understanding that financial planning professionals can deliver,” said FPSB chief executive officer Dante De Gori in a statement. 

“As more consumers use AI to learn about finances, financial planners can help them understand what is relevant, what requires caution and how financial decisions fit within a broader, long-term plan.”

To respond to clients demands 34 per cent of financial advisers named AI education and training as the single initiative to make the use of AI more responsible and safer and 50 per cent want further professional development in data analysis and interpretation.

How advisers are using AI

Eight in 10 financial advisers said their firm is either using or planning to use AI in the next 12 months. Meanwhile, those not using it has gone down from 35 percent to 20 per cent.

In a briefing with journalists in September, FAAA chief executive officer Sarah Abood said that the previous FPSB AI report found Australian financial planners were the largest adopters of AI.

“And we are using it primarily as an efficiency tool. So, advisors are using it to keep notes of meetings. They’re using it to generate compliance documents and so on.”

According to the latest report, the top ways in which AI is being used to serve clients across the world by advisers are for communications and engagement, market analysis and investment, collection of client information and risk profiling.

AI will help advisers serve clients better according to 83 per cent of the respondents, up from 78 per cent in the previous year. All points saw an increase but the largest movement in the study from the previous year was that 75 per cent said AI will improve the quality of advice, up from 60 per cent.

There has been a shift in what type of AI firms are deploying whether from third-party vendors, developed in house or a combination of both. Whereas in 2025 45 per cent was using third-party solutions and 34 per cent in-house ones, now the majority (38 per cent) is using a combination of both.

Independent of the technology in use it is important firms using AI have a policy or guidance. Of those that said their firm has one, 62 per cent said the policy addresses data privacy and client information protection, 48 per cent addresses human review requirements before outputs reach clients and 40 per cent addresses the disclosure of the use of AI.

An AI policy can also cover data concerns, which is the top issue across financial advisers with 53 per cent of advisers saying their main AI concern is around data privacy and cybersecurity.

The research was conducted online by FPSB and its global network of organisations of 8,095 financial planners between 22 May and 6 July 2026.