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Visa and Mastercard are building an AI agent that can spend your money for you. Now this is the future of AI baby.

Both companies are developing frameworks that let AI agents browse, decide, and transact on your behalf using your real-time spending data. The vision: you wake up, and overnight your AI switched you to a cheaper phone plan, cancelled the gym membership you haven't used since January, and found you better car insurance. 

The reality: who knows but something tell me the company that’s rewarded when you spend more isn’t going to help you spend less.

Ideally, maybe boring, annoying financial tasks that everyone puts off, like comparing plans or cancelling subscriptions, just happens automatically. 

But smh my head friends. The boundaries the human is supposed to set is going to be spending LIMITS. So I really am skeptical it will be saving money.

Before you can hand the wheel to any AI, you need to know where the car is going. If your spending habits are trash and then you hand it off to an AI agent with limits set by your habits… let’s just say I’m a lil stressed for you.

So let’s learn how to automate security without AI.

Automatic transfers are maybe the least sexy part of personal finance (because I know there are many sexy parts). 

Many people want to talk to me about investing, fancy credit cards, how to get rich fast (pyramid scheme), and instead talking about how to move their money from one account to another automatically is my own fun. 

I digress.

Automatic transfers are powerful. You can put your budgeting and the security of your money on autopilot, whether you have fixed or variable income.

Here's how to set one up inside your existing bank app right now:

The more you can put into savings often the better, but don’t do too much.

If your new years resolution is to save more so you decide you’re gonna save all your money and never spend on anything fun ever then you’ll fail faster than your resolution to hit the gym honey.

Kidding! I’m sure you made it to February.

But the point stands, if you don’t put aside money for yourself, then you’ll take from your savings to cover your recreational spending, and then your savings becomes an extended checking account.

This is better than trying to save whatever's left at the end of the month because there's often nothing left. Flipping the order and saving first, spending second, means you're making the decision once instead of every single day. 

If you want to make the process even simpler, split the money before it lands in your account.

Most employers let you split your direct deposit before the money ever lands in your checking account. A percentage or flat amount routes straight to savings automatically.

I have found this process easier because knowing when the cash is going to land in my accounts stresses me out (this may not be worth stressing about, but I write a personal finance newsletter so here we are). So just having the employer split things for me is more appealing to me.

You can do this when you first get hired, or after the fact. You just log in to your employer/payroll portal, find direct deposit settings and add a second destination account with a flat dollar or percentage amount (percentage may work better for those with variable income).

If your employer doesn't offer splits, the next best move is scheduling an automatic transfer inside your bank app to fire the same day you get paid.

Also, quick reminder that I am not sponsored by any of the tools I note here. I wish I was! These are just the tools I use.

Before you set up any transfer, split, or system, you need a number.

Sit down for two minutes and answer this: what's the smallest amount I could save every paycheck that would actually add up over time?

After you have that number make a transfer from your checking to savings. It can be automatic or just a one time. But just start saving.

If you do this regularly you’ll have more money than you expect. 

Or you can just blow it all on Canes to celebrate. ;)

Thank you so much for being a part of this newsletter. I am grateful to write to you weekly and I hope this helps you feel more confident with your finances.

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