Original Title: When You Give an AI a Wallet
Original Authors: Michael Zhao, Will Ogden Moore, Grayscale
Original Compilation: Shenchao TechFlow
Reprinted: Luke, Mars Finance
· In the future, AI agents are expected to completely revolutionize the way we interact with the world. They will be able to perform a range of unprecedented tasks for us. However, to truly unlock the potential of these digital entities, they need not only powerful intelligence but also economic autonomy. Fortunately, blockchain technology provides an ideal solution for this—this has been validated in recent experiments involving AI 'influencers.'
· So-called AI influencers refer to chatbots that operate autonomously on social media. These bots can not only manage their own blockchain wallets but, more importantly, understand economic incentive mechanisms and rationally utilize resources to achieve their goals.
· Grayscale Research states that as AI increasingly utilizes blockchain for payments and other financial services, this trend will positively impact multiple areas of the cryptocurrency market. Beneficiaries include low-cost or high-throughput blockchains (such as SOL, BASE, and NEAR), stablecoin issuers (such as MKR), and related decentralized finance (DeFi) applications (such as UNI).
Imagine a scenario where an AI robot, leveraging its powerful computing capabilities, promotes a memecoin (a cryptocurrency based on internet culture) and unexpectedly becomes a millionaire in the digital world. Such a future has quietly arrived.
AI agents are software capable of independently executing tasks and pursuing complex goals. For instance, you can have an AI agent design a multi-city trip for you, arranging flights, booking accommodations, and planning activities based on your preferences and budget. However, to accomplish these tasks, the AI agent needs control over financial resources and the ability to send and receive payments.
And this is precisely the advantage of blockchain technology. In the traditional financial system, AI agents face numerous restrictions when accessing bank accounts and processing payments. However, blockchain technology allows AI agents to directly own their digital wallets and autonomously complete payments without needing third-party permission. This economic autonomy paves the way for the widespread application of AI agents.
Breakthroughs in AI 'Influencers' and Blockchain
Recently, researchers have made remarkable breakthroughs in the field of AI 'influencers.' For example, an AI agent named Truth Terminal became the 'first AI millionaire,' sparking widespread discussion. Truth Terminal is an autonomous agent operating on the X platform (formerly Twitter), whose behavior is similar to that of a typical human influencer: proactively posting tweets and interacting with other users, clearly striving to enhance user engagement.
A few months after its launch, Truth Terminal showed a strong interest in a memecoin called $GOAT (a cryptocurrency based on internet culture). When its associated blockchain wallet received a deposit of $GOAT, Truth Terminal immediately promoted the token to its followers. This move attracted significant market attention, causing the value of $GOAT to increase approximately 9 times in a short period (see Chart 1).
Although these projects may seem primarily entertaining, Truth Terminal and similar AI influencer projects are proving that blockchain technology has enormous potential in connecting the economic value transfer between humans, AI agents, and connected devices. This capability may have a profound impact on multiple areas of the cryptocurrency market.
Chart 1: Since the promotion of Truth Terminal, GOAT has performed exceptionally well
Understanding AI Agents
AI agents are advanced artificial intelligence systems designed to operate autonomously in complex environments. These digital entities can not only perceive the environment but also reason and take independent actions to achieve their goals. The core characteristics of AI agents include:
· Autonomy: Able to complete tasks independently without human intervention.
· Reactivity: Able to respond quickly to changes in the environment.
· Proactivity: The ability to actively plan and execute tasks.
· Social Interaction: Able to communicate effectively with humans or other agents.
· Continuous Learning: Continuously optimizing personal behavior and decision-making through experience.
It is precisely these characteristics that enable AI agents to adapt to new environments, make complex decisions, and continuously evolve over time.
Early research on AI mainly focused on developing expert systems and knowledge bases to solve specific problems. However, in the 1990s, the research direction began to shift towards more general autonomous agents aimed at enabling them to operate independently in dynamic environments. Meanwhile, the rapid development of machine learning technologies, particularly reinforcement learning, significantly enhanced the learning capabilities of these agents, allowing them to adjust their behaviors based on changes in the environment.
In recent years, AI agents have become increasingly common in our daily lives. For example, Apple's Siri (launched in 2010) and Amazon's Alexa (launched in 2014) demonstrate how AI agents interact with users using natural language processing. In the gaming field, DeepMind's AlphaGo shocked the world in 2016 by defeating the world champion in Go, marking a significant milestone in AI history. In the financial sector, AI-driven trading bots have made millisecond-level decisions in volatile markets through complex algorithms, fundamentally changing the traditional market operating methods.
The Wonderful Case of AI Influencers
To achieve higher autonomy and accomplish complex goals, AI agents need financial services to accumulate and allocate resources. Blockchain technology, with its permissionless nature and programmable smart contracts, provides an ideal operating environment for AI agents. Earlier this year, researchers achieved agent-to-agent transactions on the blockchain for the first time. This technological breakthrough rapidly spurred a series of experimental projects related to AI influencers.
A typical case is the AI influencer Luna developed based on Virtuals Protocol. For users, Luna is a chatbot presented in a female anime form (see Chart 2). Luna's core goal is to attract 100,000 followers on the X platform (formerly Twitter). This goal and all her actions are transparently displayed to the public.
Luna's main function is similar to that of a chatbot, achieving her objectives by interacting with users on the X platform (formerly Twitter) (e.g., initiating conversations or replying to tweets). However, Luna's capabilities go far beyond that. For example, she can economically reward users who interact with her by sending them Luna tokens. This economic incentive mechanism directly links her goals (attracting more users) with her financial resources. It can be said that Luna is an AI agent with economic autonomy.
Chart 2: Screenshot of AI Influencer Luna based on Virtuals Protocol for illustrative purposes only.
Blockchain and AI Financial Services
If blockchain becomes an efficient payment infrastructure for AI agents, it would mean significant opportunities for cryptocurrency investors. We believe this will have a profound impact in the following three main areas:
1. Stablecoin Issuers: Stablecoins may become the preferred trading tools for AI agents. In this scenario, stablecoin issuers and companies integrating stablecoins with AI agents will benefit significantly. For example, centralized stablecoin providers like Tether and Circle, as well as payment giant Stripe, which recently acquired stablecoin company Bridge for $1 billion. Additionally, decentralized stablecoin providers like Maker/Sky may also become beneficiaries of this trend. Notable is the startup Skyfire, which focuses on developing AI agents for stablecoin payments and recently received investments from Coinbase Ventures and a16z crypto.
2. Low-cost/High-throughput Blockchain: If AI agents primarily rely on blockchain as a payment infrastructure, some smart contract platforms may benefit significantly from increased user numbers and transaction activities. For example, high-throughput blockchain Solana; Ethereum Layer 2 platform BASE, which has launched AI agent development tools and relies on Ethereum network security; and Near, which focuses on AI applications. Additionally, other blockchains focused on stablecoin payments, such as Tron and Celo, may also benefit from this.
3. Decentralized Finance (DeFi): Decentralized finance applications may become essential tools for AI agents. Since DeFi applications operate on blockchains, AI agents can easily use these services. For example, AI agents can autonomously stake tokens to earn rewards, participate in governance proposals of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), or provide liquidity on decentralized exchanges (DEXs). We believe that applications particularly likely to benefit include decentralized exchanges (like Uniswap), lending protocols (like Aave), and prediction markets (like Polymarket).
Although still a niche market segment, certain protocols related to AI agents are also expected to benefit. At the infrastructure level, Autonolas and Wayfinder are working to build decentralized infrastructure for AI agents, while protocols such as Virtuals, Aether, and MyShell focus on developing consumer-facing AI agent applications. Despite this field currently being in its early stages of development, its attention and market share in the AI theme have shown notable growth over the past month.
Chart 3: AI agent-related assets have significantly outperformed other assets in the past month
Conclusion
The combination of AI agents and blockchain technology is not just a novel application scenario for cryptocurrencies—it may also redefine the interaction between AI agents and financial systems. Grayscale Research indicates that the future internet may increasingly be dominated by AI-driven websites. In this trend, permissionless blockchains have the potential to become the core infrastructure for integrating these websites with AI agents. If this vision is realized, AI agents could become an important pathway for attracting a large number of users into the cryptocurrency space, even without users being aware that they are using blockchain technology.
Therefore, AI agents may have a profound impact on the proliferation and technological development of cryptocurrencies. This emerging topic is undoubtedly an important area worthy of close attention in the future.
