OpenAI is training its AI that could automate the most time-consuming parts of entry-level banking jobs, reported Bloomberg.
Codenamed ‘Project Mercury’, the initiative involves over 100 former investment bankers who are helping train the AI to build financial models for transactions such as IPOs and restructurings. The participants, drawn from firms like JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley, are paid $150 an hour to write prompts, construct models, and provide feedback on results.
The aim is to handle the grunt work that typically keeps junior analysts at their desks for 80-hour weeks, from complex Excel models to endless PowerPoint edits. By simulating how human analysts operate, OpenAI aims to make its models capable of automating these repetitive tasks.
Applicants to Project Mercury go through a fully automated recruitment process that includes an AI interview, a financial statement test, and a modelling assessment. Contractors submit one model per week for review.
According to the Bloomberg report, the company will collaborate with experts to improve and evaluate the capabilities of models across different domains, noting that these professionals are managed by third-party suppliers.
The project highlights OpenAI’s growing push to apply its technology to specific business sectors, including finance, consulting, and legal services. The Bloomberg report also added that despite the company’s $500 billion valuation, the company has yet to report a profit, and this development could be one of the ways to commercialise its AI tools more directly.
While AI could ease the workload of junior bankers, it’s also raising questions about the future of entry-level jobs in the financial industry.
Perplexity, on the other hand, already has an offering called Perplexity Finance that is closer to what OpenAI plans to add. Users should gain more clarity only when OpenAI discloses more details on how they plan to add these abilities, or if it will be limited to banking organisations.
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