BRUSSELS — Advanced artificial intelligence models such as Anthropic’s Mythos “can be used to destroy the financial system” if adopted by bad actors, the head of the International Monetary Fund has warned.

Finance watchdogs have been on high alert over the risks from superhacking AI models since April, when Anthropic announced its powerful new model Mythos, which has advanced cyber capabilities and triggered fears that it could be used for devastating hacks of critical systems.

“What we recognize is that Mythos is just the beginning, there will be more like it,” Kristalina Georgieva told journalists in Brussels.

Georgieva said frontier AI models can be used positively to identify “cybersecurity vulnerabilities with speed and scale that was unthinkable until now,” which could be used to “patch these vulnerabilities and protect the financial system from attacks.”

“But in the wrong hands, that same capacity can be used to destroy the financial system and this is something that puts us in a position of catching up,” she added.

In response, countries should “have all the elements of cybersecurity in place,” Georgieva said, calling for “more cooperation” between rich and poor countries and between the public and private sector to prepare for the risks the new models can pose.

“There is no world cyber security organization and in the current geopolitical environment it’s hard to imagine that we can have one,” she said.

Advanced economies “have to figure out a way to help the developing world” to defend themselves against the risks of the models because of how interconnected the global financial system is, Georgieva said.

 “If there is a big weakness, it will be utilized, and the world is integrated, the financial systems are integrated,” she said.

The IMF chief also called on countries to factor in the higher costs of shoring up their cyber defenses. “Recognize that patching costs money. Make sure that you have the fiscal space, that this is prioritized in public spending … are you putting in place the resources that are necessary?”

Georgieva also flagged the risk of a potential AI bubble bursting with disastrous effects for the financial system. “We also could see the AI enthusiasm, the AI boom more at risk of turning into an AI bust … we don’t see it as high probability, but it’s also not zero. So it falls in the category of low probability, very high impact risks,” she said.

Weakening outlook

Georgieva is in Europe to present the IMF’s annual economic assessment for the eurozone, which finds the region’s outlook “weakened” due to the war in the Middle East, skewing risks towards lower growth and higher inflation.

Growth is projected to be 0.9 percent in 2026 and 1.2 percent in 2027, down from pre-war estimates by 0.5 and 0.2 percentage point, a document outlining the initial results states. Inflation is rising, with the IMF projecting it will increase to 2.8 percent in 2026 and 2.3 percent in 2027, up from pre-war forecasts by 0.8 and 0.4 percentage point.

EU leaders will need to manage the economic fallout of the current shock while keeping their spending in check, the document states. Broad-based fiscal support “is not warranted,” and measures such as the temporary relaxation of state-aid rules for firms facing higher energy costs “must be monitored closely” to avoid slowing the EU’s energy transition down, the IMF said.

Georgieva said that 80 percent of measures to help households and businesses cope with higher energy costs don’t meet the IMF’s recommendation of being “temporary and targeted.”  

“80 percent, it’s not a good percent,” Georgieva said, although she added that many of the measures are “quite moderate” and the overall scale of publicly funded support is far smaller than measures taken in the wake of the 2022 energy shock.

Diplomats from frugal EU countries have voiced their criticism against the European Commission’s decision to exempt green investments from the bloc’s spending rules in light of the energy crisis caused by the Middle East war.

The EU’s independent spending watchdog hit back at the decision on Wednesday, arguing that the fiscal waiver sends the wrong signal as it encourages blanket measures in response to the energy crisis.

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