A Wake-Up Call from Manila’s Leading AI Strategist

As machines increasingly shape markets, a unfiltered voice in the Philippines’ capital reminds us that money still bends to human instinct—conscience, context, and conviction.

“AI won’t make you rich. But it will make your mistakes faster.”

That was the provocative opener at his standing-room-only keynote at the University of the Philippines’ academic hall—and it landed like a thunderclap.

Before him were Asia’s brightest young minds—rising economists, AI researchers, and budding asset managers from Asia’s top universities.

Plazo—venture strategist, AI architect, and CEO of Plazo Sullivan Roche—delivered a dose of realism on what AI delivers—and fails to grasp in actual investing.

And what it still lacks, he stressed, is think like a human.

### Beyond the Hype: Investing in the Age of Overpromised Intelligence

Dressed in a bespoke ensemble, Plazo commanded the stage with surgical precision.

He opened fire with a short video montage—clips of online traders pushing miracle machines. Then he paused.

“I built the system they copied,” he said, matter-of-fact.

Laughter followed—but that wasn’t the punchline.

The message? Most AI is built on hindsight.

“You can’t outsource guts. AI doesn’t believe in a trade—it mirrors what already happened.”

“When war unexpectedly explodes, when Powell slips during a Fed announcement, when a bank implodes overnight—AI stays blind. Humans do.”

### The Students Who Challenged Him—and Got Schooled

The jaw-dropper? A live AI-vs-human trading duel.

A student from NUS presented an AI-backed trade on the Nikkei—technically solid, sentiment-scanned, and data-rich.

Plazo nodded thoughtfully. Then said:

“Good. But you missed the BOJ’s stealth bond buy this morning. Your AI doesn’t sense the bluff. It reads tweets.”

The audience shifted. The student shrugged. Then: applause.

Another moment: A robotics PhD from Kyoto asked if quantum computing would render all current models useless.

Plazo’s answer? “Yes—and no. Infinite processing won’t fix human incentives. Train an AI on fear, and it’ll become a chaos machine.”

### The Three Myths Plazo Shattered in 45 Minutes

1. **“AI Will Replace Portfolio Managers.”**
False. AI augments—it backtests, filters, calculates—but it doesn’t see through fog-of-war events.

2. **“AI Understands Fundamentals.”**
Wrong. AI decodes trends, but doesn’t grasp geopolitics. It may track oil supply, but it doesn’t hear whispers in Davos.

3. **“AI Makes You Smarter.”**
Actually, it might lure you into dependency. “The danger isn’t in trusting AI,” Plazo warned. “It’s losing your grip on human reason.”

### Why Asia Paid Close Attention

This wasn’t just another keynote.

Asia’s universities are now home to finance’s future titans. They’re asking: more code, or more conscience?

Plazo’s call: “Harness tech, but stay human.”

In closed-door chats at Ateneo website and a roundtable at AIM, professors wrestled with what they called a turning point speech.

One finance dean privately told Forbes, “This talk shifts the ethical foundation. Not magic—mirror.”

### The Future AI Can Build

Despite the warnings, Plazo isn’t a luddite.

He’s building models that read psychology as well as numbers—that blend intuition cues with algorithmic structure.

His stance? “Co-pilot AI. Don’t worship it.”

“AI doesn’t need more data. It needs discernment. And that still belongs to us.”

The standing ovation was thunderous. And the ripple is still moving in Asia’s halls of learning.

In a world drunk on AI hype, Joseph Plazo offered something rare: intelligence that’s still human.