Why do traders in investment banks feel their jobs are immune from AI, etc?

A lot of traders are losing their jobs, and many fear this.

As other mention, though, Wall Street makes a lot of money trading the edge cases. For instance, many people thought derivatives traders would become obsolete when the Black Scholes formula arrived. In reality, the model grew the size of the derivatives market, and traders made money knowing where the model was wrong. (Example: It assumes constant volatility)

Similarly, many investors use an OAS (Option Adjusted Spread) model to justify prices on one-off Mortgage Backed Securities. This also helps grow the market, as there's more transparent pricing. But traders know where the models are wrong, and make money off of them.

When technology enabled FX trade spreads to be less than a penny, people thought traders were done. But this increased the volume of trading (more hedging became cost-efficient) so while the % skimmed by traders decreased, the absolute $s increased.

Net, as long as the financial pie grows, traders can find ways to siphon money off. That amount may grow or shrink, but generally the story is more technology has helped them.

Perhaps the best analogy is a chess expert paired with a computer can beat either the computer or the expert alone.

For a decade now, I can't figure out why we still bother with Realtors. It's basically eight courses, and an easy test. Oh, and the experience. Don't get me started.

It's the biggest purchase most of us will make, so I understand the need for hand holding, but times have changed. The typical buyer is educated, and in all likelyhood knows about as much as the typical ex-cheerleader Realtor.

I thought the profession would be gone by now. It is ripe for elimination.

The only reason I would use a realtor is out of convention. And believe me, I would want to see a fresh copy of their omissions & errors insurance premium. (Need someone to sue, but that could easily be the Seller if they lied.)

Sorry if I sound bitter. I just don't get giving away 3% on huge amounts of money for essentially hand holding.

(In CA, the Realtors Lobbyists tried to cut down on new Brokers by making the Brokers licence harder to obtain. Gov. Schwartzeneger saw right through the ploy, and vetoed the bill. He knew they just wanted to decrease the amount of Brokers, so the Cheerleaders would have less competition. Gov. Brown let the bill ride right through. All of you should remember that when paying thousands of dollars (full commission) for a few hours of a Realtors time. When that bill passed, I became an Independant.)

Do you consider several hedge funds consistently beating the market with significant margins for over 20 years to be "anecdotal" evidence?

The evidence shows that it is very difficult for traders to consistently beat the market. The evidence does not show that their performance, as a profession, is random.

No. In casinos the games are designed so that in the long run the house always wins. They don't need to care about odds.

The stock market isn't a game; it isn't designed and it continuously evolves.

Well, no, not really. Ideally a car has a definable spec, such as a road with consistent markers. Steering within a consistent set of lines and reacting to other cars on the road is difficult enough, especially if you try to account for random behavior from other drivers.

Modeling and forecasting a security's price mathematically, or a set of security prices, is complex in a different sort of way. A better analogy would be like trying to program a car to deal with a meteorite that suddenly hits the road in a random spot, or a bomb that goes off 100 feet in front of the car as it's cruising on the road. There are far fewer rules with which to start a foundation, and the entire macroeconomic structure is far more delicate and in constant flux from news, other traders competing against you, information closed to the market, etc. With cars, you at least get a road, and add randomness in with other drivers. With security prices, you might have a lower bound of potential losses, if you're buying long. It's just a different animal.