RBC, TD rank among top 10 banks for AI maturity

RBC and TD ranked among the world’s 10 most mature banks for artificial intelligence, according to an Evident Insights report released Tuesday.

RBC ranked third for the fourth consecutive year, behind JPMorganChase and Capital One, while TD climbed three spots to 10th. BMO retreated one spot to 20th; CIBC rose one place to 21st; and Scotiabank slipped one spot to 30th.

The top three positions have remained unchanged since the index launched in 2023.

RBC ranked eighth for AI talent, fifth for innovation, second for leadership and third for transparency. Evident highlighted the bank’s AI research capabilities and its efforts to turn that research into tools used across the organization.

RBC is targeting between $700 million and $1 billion in net value from AI by fiscal 2027, including gains from personalization, productivity, operational changes and risk reduction. The bank remained on track toward that target through the third quarter of 2026, the report said.

The bank has also deployed AI in its capital markets and insurance businesses. Aiden QuickTakes, an AI tool used in capital markets research, reduced the time needed to complete some post-earnings work from as much as 45 minutes to about 15 minutes. RBC Insurance’s Clara tool, which uses generative AI to identify potentially fraudulent claims, generated $2.4 million in savings during its first year as a pilot, the report noted.

TD ranked ninth for both talent and innovation, 11th for leadership and fifth for transparency. The bank has increasingly focused its AI investments on areas including credit, software development and contact centres.

The bank is also beginning to report financial results from its AI investments. TD generated $195 million in AI-related value against its $200-million target in the first nine months of fiscal 2026.

One of TD’s first agentic AI applications is being used in mortgage adjudication. The system scans borrower documents, verifies income, checks policy requirements and prepares information for underwriters. A process that previously took an average of 15 hours can now be completed in about three minutes, with all new personal mortgages now using this process.

Still, measurable returns from AI remain uncommon across the industry. Of more than 1,100 AI use cases with reported outcomes Evident tracked since 2021, just 12% disclosed an operational metric and only 1% disclosed a direct financial impact.

The top 10 banks accounted for a disproportionately larger share of the more measurable results. While they represented 25% of use cases with reported impact claims, they accounted for 34% of those reporting operational metrics and half of those reporting direct financial results.

Evident ranks banks based on publicly available information across four areas: talent, innovation, leadership and responsible-AI transparency. The October index covered 50 banks in North America, Europe and Asia.