Last week, LSEG hosted Financial Markets Connect 2025 at the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) Savoy Place in London. The event brought together over 400 thought leaders, innovators and financial professionals from across the financial markets ecosystem. Key takeaways include:
- Agentic AI is becoming a core part of financial workflows, enabling smarter, faster and more autonomous decision-making across the front, middle and back office.
- Interoperability, cloud infrastructure and an engineering mindset are essential to building scalable, integrated systems that support this transformation.
- Human-centric innovation remains critical, with firms focusing on reskilling, culture and accountability to ensure AI enhances rather than replaces human expertise.
The day featured a series of expert-led panels exploring the most pressing themes in finance and technology.
Revolutionising customer experience in financial services
Financial Markets Connect 2025 opened with remarks from Nej D'Jelal, Global Head of Workspace and Interim Co-Head of Workflows at LSEG, who set the stage for the day’s discussions before introducing the plenary session on ‘Revolutionising customer experience in financial services.’
Panellists included Niall Archibald, Director, Business Strategy at Microsoft, Matt McLoughlin, Former Partner & Chief Commercial Officer at Liontrust Asset Management and Dara L. Sosulski, PhD, Head of Artificial Intelligence and Model Management at HSBC.
The panel explored how agentic AI and automation are transforming customer engagement across financial services. Speakers emphasised the importance of interoperable platforms that enable seamless workflows and reduce friction in client interactions. With tools like LSEG Workspace and Microsoft 365 Copilot, firms are moving towards intent-driven experiences, where AI anticipates needs and delivers personalised insights in real time.
Insights continued in the two breakout sessions that followed:
Investment banking: AI adoption and the journey to enhanced productivity for investment bankers
Moderator Mahmoud Khliefat, Head of Capital Markets Data & Analytics at LSEG, was joined by John Willett, Co-Founder and COO at Rogo, Demetris Efthymiou, Managing Director, Investment Banking Strategic Advisory at Evercore and Sahana Prabhakar, Principal Engineer and Architect at Microsoft.
This session focused on how banks and fintechs are collaborating to embed AI into the daily workflows of investment bankers. The shift from open-ended prompts to customisable, context-aware AI agents is enabling more relevant insights and measurable productivity gains.
Panellists highlighted the growing use of quantifiable metrics to track the impact of AI on deal execution, research, and client service.
Trading and Asset Management: Leveraging data and relationships in the evolving trading landscape
LSEG’s David Rickard hosted panellists John Dioufas, Director of Datastream and Macroeconomics at LSEG, Karim Chedid, Head of EMEA Investment Strategy at Blackrock and Deniz Mace-Jone, Global Head of Rates & Credit Product and Electronic Distribution at UBS.
This discussion examined the evolving role of data and human relationships in increasingly automated trading environments. While AI and electronification are accelerating, trusted relationships and market intuition remain vital.
Panellists reflected on recent market dynamics - from macroeconomic uncertainty to the rise of portfolio trading - and how firms are adapting their strategies to stay competitive.
Finally, audiences heard from keynote speaker, economic futurist and former Chief Market Intelligence Officer at the U.S. CFTC, Andrew Busch. Andy’s keynote offered a compelling exploration of how macroeconomic forces and technological innovation are converging to reshape global financial markets. He addressed the growing complexity of the fiscal landscape, marked by geopolitical disruptions, shifting interest rate regimes, and evolving regulatory pressures.
Against this backdrop, Busch emphasised the accelerating role of AI – not as a distant concept, but as a present-day force driving real economic change. He highlighted how generative AI is already delivering tangible benefits, from real-time risk flagging to proactive insight generation. The message was clear: intelligence is a competitive differentiator, and firms that can interpret macro signals in real time will be best positioned to lead.
Attendees were able to experience LSEG Workspace in Apple Vision Pro, developed with our partners at EPAM Systems.
During the evening reception, attendees had the opportunity to experience LSEG Workspace firsthand – a platform purpose-built to meet the rising expectations of today’s financial professionals.
Workspace brings together LSEG’s leading content, analytics, and collaboration tools into a seamless, end-to-end experience, integrated across Microsoft and LSEG interfaces. With its open architecture, real-time data access, and embedded generative AI capabilities, Workspace addresses the inefficiencies of fragmented systems—reducing manual effort, surfacing insights, and enabling professionals to focus on what matters most. Whether it’s streamlining deal preparation for investment bankers or unifying FX trading workflows, Workspace is setting a new standard for productivity, clarity, and collaboration in financial services
As the financial services industry continues to evolve, the key themes from Financial Markets Connect 2025 — agentic AI, interoperability, and human-centric innovation — will remain central to driving progress.
We encourage all attendees and those who couldn’t join us in London to view the recordings and revisit the insights shared by industry leaders.
Don’t miss the next opportunities to connect and collaborate. Join us at Financial Markets Connect New York and Hong Kong later this year, where we’ll continue the conversation and explore what’s next for global finance.
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