Financial advice given to savers by conversational robots, or chatbots, wrongly increases user confidence, concludes a study by the Prudential Control and Resolution Authority (ACPR), the banking and insurance policeman.
The explanations provided in the form of a conversation wrongly increase the confidence of users in the incorrect proposals of the robot-advisor and can make them accept more badly adapted advice, indicates in summary this study transmitted Thursday to the press and carried out in partnership with the school of Telecom Paris engineers.
A robo-advisor, called Robex, was developed for the needs of the study, carried out with 256 participants, mostly novices in financial matters, says the supervisor.
Conversational robots, based on algorithms and artificial intelligence, are the fashion among life insurers and bankers to offer, in parallel with advisers, financial investments for their clients.
The motivation of the advice through these tools sometimes lacks clarity or remains too generic, without precise explanations based on the specific characteristics of the client, underlines the study.
Furthermore, the explanations given by the robot do not significantly improve users’ understanding of the proposal, nor their ability to follow or not the advice given, depending on whether it is correct or not.
More annoyingly, people who have received a lower level of education understand an incorrect proposition less well but are more likely to accept it anyway.
French financial regulations, reminds the APCR, require that advice for the choice of a contract be justified by showing the client the link between the characteristics of the financial proposal and his personal situation.
The objective is to protect the client from the negative consequences of choosing an ill-suited investment, whether it is too risky or does not meet its objectives, further underlines the authority.
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