In the article "From DeSci to AI Agents: Interpreting Potential Tracks" published on December 6th,
I listed several conditions that I believe need to be met for a track to become a potential track in this round of market sentiment:
- It must have a very strong ecological demonstration effect, and even develop to a certain stage, other ecologies will be eager to join the battle.
- It must have benchmark projects, to the extent that every project trying to establish this ecology will say, "We want to become the XXX of the XXX ecosystem."
- Of course, it must also have a strong wealth effect, and this wealth effect cannot be limited to one or two isolated cases, but a group of projects that allow participants to earn considerable returns, forming a group effect. In addition, this wealth effect must be able to last for a period of time, not just making money yesterday, today, and then zeroing out tomorrow.
- Finally, it is most likely to be a new track. Because the new track has not been tried before, even a slight new gameplay can trigger unlimited imagination.
Now it seems that the AI agent track is increasingly meeting the above conditions.
Just last Friday, the largest AI agent financing platform in the Base ecosystem, Virtuals (https://app.virtuals.io/), had a circulating market capitalization/total market capitalization of its token VIRTUAL that has already exceeded $2 billion.
This market capitalization was achieved without being listed on Binance, OKX, or even the platform behind it, Coinbase.
Under these circumstances, this market capitalization has already topped the list of AI agent tokens, and is significantly ahead of other AI agent tokens (including meme coins initiated by AI agents).
In terms of market capitalization, it has already become the benchmark project in the AI agent track.
At the same time, a series of AI agent tokens funded or initiated by the Virtuals project team, which started together with the Virtuals platform, have also "soared" during this period, clearly forming a clustering effect.
Under this effect, other Layer 2 expansions of Ethereum, such as zkSync and Arbitrum, have also emerged with similar projects, and the project parties have clearly stated on their Twitter that they want to develop their own AI agent platforms.
The AI agent track has obviously spread rapidly from the initial Solana and Base to other ecosystems.
During this period, when I checked information about AI agents on Twitter, I saw several times some very inspiring information, and the first thing I would do was to look at which KOL had posted the information, only to find that they were all from the AI agent AIXBT.
At least for the AI agent AIXBT issued by the Virtuals platform, I believe it is no longer a meme coin, but has truly generated actual value and utility.
More importantly, this value is sustainable and developmental, and is not simply driven by intermittent emotions like meme coins.
I believe that the case of AIXBT is not an isolated one.
In the article on December 2nd, I shared some views expressed by the co-founder of the Virtuals platform in an interview. In that interview, he also mentioned that there are several hundred AI agents waiting to be launched on the platform.
Now this number should be even higher.
Even if many of these projects ultimately turn out to be bubbles, as long as a few more AI agents like AIXBT that truly generate actual value and utility emerge, the value and narrative space they bring cannot be underestimated.
TechFlow has an article that provides a relatively detailed introduction to the current AI agent ecosystem. The link to the article is attached at the end.
This article lists a number of projects, but what I am more concerned about is its division of the sub-sectors within this ecosystem. For investors who are interested in this ecosystem, focusing on the projects mentioned is one aspect, but more importantly, it is to find the sub-sectors that fit their own tastes and expertise. Seek opportunities within this sub-sector.
For investors, when we discover a potential new track, the highest returns are of course to go straight to the sub-sector that we are most proficient in and understand. Find small-cap, newly launched projects in this sub-sector. But this carries high risk and high threshold.
If we are not sure about the reliability of specific projects, a simpler approach is to find a reliable platform. Because the judgment criteria of the platform are much simpler and easier to grasp. Compared to specific projects, the returns of platform tokens may be smaller, but the risks are also smaller.
If a few more projects that can provide real services and value emerge in the AI agent track, I believe it could really become the main driver of the upcoming market sentiment, and projects with a market capitalization exceeding $100 billion could appear.
As for the AI agent track, I believe it is still in the early stage.
