Dutch banks expect to shed around 2,600 jobs in their anti–money laundering departments within two years as they turn to artificial intelligence to handle routine work, the Financieele Dagblad reported on Friday.

At present, some 13,000 people — roughly a fifth of the sector’s staff — are employed full time in these departments, costing the industry €1.4 billion a year, according to Dutch banking association figures.

Executives from ABN Amro, ING, Rabobank and ASN Bank told a finance conference in Driebergen that the large hiring drive of recent years is over, now that backlogs have been cleared following several high profile multi-million euro legal cases.

ABN Amro’s head of financial crime, Jaap van der Molen, said the current approach is a “negative business case.” He told the conference that in 2024 the authorities seized about €400 million in criminal assets, compared with €1.4 billion spent annually by banks, plus an estimated €1 billion in extra paperwork costs for companies and individuals.

The use of AI should make investigations more efficient by scanning transaction data alongside company records, with analysts only needed to verify results, he said. “On paper you could build an entire case file with AI,” Van der Molen said.

Bankers also want to see a lighter regime from the regulators. Outgoing finance minister Eelco Heinen said earlier this year that the Dutch anti-laundering system had “overshot its target,” creating unnecessary burdens for ordinary customers and companies.

He also called on banks to concentrate on high-risk cases, with stronger support from supervisors such as the Dutch central bank. The current regime has led to some people being refused accounts, particularly those in sectors which rely on cash money, and private individuals with foreign backgrounds.

Heinen also said in January he wants banks to be able to share information about their customers as part of anti-money laundering investigations, despite privacy concerns.