Investment Firm CEO Tells Thousands in Conference Audience That 60% of Them Will Be ‘Looking for Work’ Next Year

Robert F. Smith, the CEO of investment firm Vista Equity Partners, said on Thursday that AI will overturn the job market and lead to layoffs for most finance professionals.

Speaking at the SuperReturn International private capital conference in Berlin, which attracted over 5,500 attendees, Smith predicted that by next year, 40% of finance professionals at the event would be using AI agents while the remaining 60% would be searching for new employment. AI agents are programs that run autonomously to perform complex, multi-step tasks.

Related: AI Is Dramatically Decreasing Entry-Level Hiring at Big Tech Companies, According to a New Analysis

“We think that next year, 40% of the people at this conference will have an AI agent and the remaining 60% will be looking for work,” Smith said, per Bloomberg. SuperReturn claims to be the world’s largest private equity event, with senior leaders from major investment firms, such as Goldman Sachs and BlackRock, in attendance.

^{Robert F. Smith, billionaire and chairman and chief executive officer of Vista Equity Partners. Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty Images}

Smith emphasized in his remarks at the event that “all of the jobs” currently carried out by one billion knowledge workers today would change due to AI.

“I’m not saying they will all go away, but they will all change,” Smith said. “You will have hyperproductive people in organizations, and you will have people who will need to find other things to do.”

Vista is one of the largest private equity firms in the world, with over $100 billion in assets under management. The company focuses its investments on software, data, and technology businesses.

Related: AI Could Replace 200,000 Jobs on Wall Street, According to a New Report. These Are the Jobs Most at Risk.

Reports show that jobs in the financial sector are ripe for replacement or augmentation with AI. Citigroup released a report on AI in finance in June 2024 that found that 54% of finance jobs “have a high potential for automation,” and an additional 12% of roles could be “augmented” or improved with AI. The report stated that AI could cause the banking industry’s global profit pool to rise from $1.7 trillion to almost $2 trillion by 2028.

Meanwhile, a survey of chief information and technology officers, released in January by Bloomberg Intelligence, showed that AI could cause as many as 200,000 job cuts on Wall Street within the next five years.