In a lecture that defied tech evangelism, investment technologist Joseph Plazo unsettled a roomful of Asia’s top students with a message few in the tech elite are willing to confront: Speed and scale are not substitutes for discernment.
**MANILA —** On a thick Thursday morning in the wood-paneled halls of the AIM campus, Plazo eschewed celebration. His audience—a curated gathering from NUS, Kyoto, HKUST—came expecting an ode to artificial intelligence in finance.
Instead, they received a necessary reckoning.
“AI is like your smartest intern,” he said, half-joking. “But you still don’t hand the intern the vault keys.”
Laughter followed. And then reflection. Because he wasn’t joking.
### A Technologist Questions the Hype He Helped Build
Plazo isn’t an outsider to this world—he’s part of the architecture. His firm, Plazo Sullivan Roche Capital, trains some of the most widely used trading AIs globally. But that proximity to power makes his critique all the more potent.
“The problem isn’t the tech,” he said. “It’s our delusion that it will save us from the weight of responsibility.”
Plazo offered real-world case studies—AIs that, on paper, flagged perfect trades. Only to be undone by things no algorithm could foresee: a shift in public sentiment.
Context, he argued, remains the province of people.
### The Challenge from the Young—Met by Experience
One Kyoto student asked whether LLMs could model global mood.
Plazo didn’t hesitate.
“AI can detect outrage in a tweetstorm,” he said. “But it can’t hear hesitation in a leader’s voice.”
A shared understanding followed.
Another student asked if AI might simulate conviction.
“Conviction,” Plazo replied, “isn’t data. It’s the bruises of being wrong—and surviving. It’s knowing when *not* to act.”
You can’t upload that.
### Beyond Algorithms: A Call to Grow Up
Many students—confident in their tools—admitted to viewing AI as a workaround. A way to evade risk. Bypass emotion. Plazo challenged that notion.
“You can streamline your trading logic. But never your ethics.”
It struck a chord.
Because whether they wore suits or sandals, most in that room shared one goal: success. But Plazo asked a deeper question—*at what cost?*
### This Wasn’t Techlash—It Was Tech Maturity
Plazo was not anti-AI. He enumerated its strengths:
- Filtering massive noise
- Identifying technical patterns at scale
- Stress-testing portfolios in seconds
But he also listed its limits—starkly.
It can’t detect sarcasm. It can’t weigh political nuance. And it doesn’t know that your retirement plan may hang in the balance.
“If the algorithm fails,” he asked, “will you take responsibility? Or just blame the machine?”
The room was quiet. That quiet held meaning.
### AI Can Read Charts—But Not You
What emerged wasn’t Joseph Plazo TedTalks a rejection of AI, but a reminder of its place.
Plazo described tools he’s building that consider misinformation, psychological factors—even geopolitical instability. But his parting truth was unambiguous:
“No machine can tell you when *not* to act. That’s a human burden.”
### Maybe the Future Doesn’t Need More AI—But Better Humans
As the crowd dispersed—some thoughtful, some rattled—one phrase echoed in the corridors:
“AI doesn’t know your values. So don’t let it make your decisions.”
In an age obsessed with speed and prediction, Plazo offered something radical:
Judgment.
Because in the end, investing isn’t about beating the market.
It’s about remembering *why* you entered the arena in the first place.