The strange new world of AI-driven financial speculation and what it reveals about the nature of value
On a Tuesday morning in March 2026, something peculiar happened in the currency markets. The Japanese yen strengthened by 2.3% against the dollar in the space of eleven minutes — a movement that, in the old world of human-paced trading, would have taken days and required a clear macroeconomic catalyst. There was no catalyst. No central bank announcement, no geopolitical shock, no earnings surprise. The movement was, by every traditional measure, inexplicable.
Except that it wasn’t. A subsequent investigation by the Bank for International Settlements traced the movement to a cascade of decisio...