AI Agent × Crypto: Is the revolutionary moment of the crypto world coming?

Author: Bingwa

The AI Agent is on fire in the crypto world, and it's about to explode, in the face of the huge wealth effect, it has been shaped into a new revolutionary variable, hot and unparalleled. However, the word "revolutionary" is a highly inflationary concept in the crypto world, scattered in large and small whitepapers and social media, for old-timers, such rhetoric can hardly make people Passion, the rise and fall of countless tokens in the crypto world in the past have proved that only a handful of new narratives have achieved the crypto bull market, the vast majority are just a flash in the pan.

So, we must go further to discuss a classic question in the crypto world: xxx, will it be different this time? Everyone has different answers, but if we look back on the past, at least the fundamental conclusion of this question will not change much.

That is: the crypto world follows the attention economy, how far the new narrative can go depends on how much user attention and network effects can be spread, even Bitcoin cannot escape this fundamental law.

Naturally, if we want to analyze this problem, we must start from the source and explore the answer to the problem.

I. What is an AI Agent?

AI Agent refers to Artificial Intelligence Agent, the currently relatively well-known and commonly used concept is: AI Agent is an intelligent entity that can perceive the environment, make decisions and take actions. It is mainly based on LLM (large language model), in other words, it is the functional carrier of the large language model. The interesting point is that, in the intuitive concept, it is a specific application of LLM, but in the name it is called Agent, emphasizing the power and ability to be endowed with autonomous choice, action and decision-making.

In terms of the definition, although AI Agent and large models have a sequential relationship, large models need prompts to give specific tasks and then give answers, while AI Agent will decompose the steps of execution and give itself prompts based on your goals, and then achieve the completion of the goals.

In terms of human-AI collaboration, the Agent mode is also a relatively advanced way of collaboration, analogous to the early Siri - Microsoft Coplilot - AI Agent. From this collaboration, we can basically confirm that the AI Agent is essentially a digital mapping of human thinking and behavior patterns, so its structure is mainly a question-and-answer entry + a fully automated workflow (perception, decision-making, action) + a knowledge base (human hippocampus), and AI completes most of the work, rather than just an assistive relationship.

In terms of the specific technical framework, Lilian Weng, the former chief security researcher at Open AI, wrote a blog in June 2023 with the title "LLM Powered Autonomous Agents" to elaborate on this specifically:

In this article, Lilian Weng proposes that the basic framework of the AI Agent = LLM + planning + memory + tool use, and the main role of the large model is to undertake functions similar to human brain reasoning and planning.

In general, the AI Agent is a separate computing entity, based on the reasoning and planning functions of the large model, combined with the perception of the external environment, tool use, and action, to achieve the role of AI as a human agent to complete a series of relatively complex tasks.

II. How is the AI Agent industry progressing?

Since 2023, the AI Agent has entered the industry's vision, and the discussion and progress of the Agent has been accelerating, with most of the big companies seeing 2025 as a key year for the commercial explosion of the AI Agent, and the industry is entering a period of accelerated development.

From the overall perspective of the industry chain, the upstream is still dominated by hardware suppliers such as Nvidia, data suppliers, and algorithm and large model developers, the midstream is mainly AI Agent integrators, and the downstream is vertical applications for different industries or general Agents.

Excluding the existing infrastructure in the upstream, the current AI Agent industry is mainly concentrated in the midstream and downstream, especially the downstream applications have shown a blossoming state.

In addition, from the development of the downstream, both the C-end and the B-end have different progress, the C-end can greatly improve the user experience by using the AI Agent, and the B-end can greatly reduce costs and increase efficiency by using the AI Agent.

Looking at the actions of several big companies, the current AI Agent is accelerating its launch in the second half of this year, and is expected to accelerate overall next year.

1. Google released Gemini 2.0 this month, not only emphasizing that the model is mainly for AI Agent service, but also released three AI Agent products: Project Astra (general), Project Mariner (browser operation) and Jules (programming).

2. Microsoft launched 10 AI Agents on its Dynamics 365 platform at the end of October this year.

3. Amazon announced this month that it will open an AI lab in San Francisco, focusing on the implementation of AI Agents.

4. Open AI has been launching a series of new products for 12 consecutive days this month, and Sam Altman himself has claimed that next year will be the year when AI Agents enter the mainstream, although Open AI itself has not released any related AI agents, but has launched a series of tools to support the development of AI agents on the basic framework.

Whether it is the big companies or the prosperity of the industry, the AI Agent is indeed entering an accelerated period, and its entry into the crypto world is just a matter of time, but everything is still in the early stage.

III. Where is the foothold of the combination of AI Agent and Crypto?

Turning the clock back a few months, Andy Ayrey, who created the Truth of Terminal model, probably never imagined that an experimental AI Agent model would create a shocking wealth miracle in the crypto world, and the derived GOATSE concept has become a crypto hotspot, the MEME token GOAT has soared to $20 million in half a day, close to $300 million in market value in four days, and over $1 billion in market value in a month, a miracle of a thousandfold increase. The AI Agent has entered the crypto world in a very crypto way, and has set off a shocking wave.

Subsequently, Ai16Z (an AI Agent-driven venture capital fund) quickly became popular with the concept of "AI-driven DAO", coupled with the support of Marc Andreessen, the founding partner of the traditional A16z, it has increased by more than 10 times in just a few days; later another AI project ACT was launched on Binance, which directly pushed the AI Agent to a new climax, not only with unprecedented market volume, but also made the vast crypto users deeply realize the wealth effect of this track.

The first two chapters of this article have spent a lot of space to explain what an AI Agent is and the industrial development of the AI Agent, the important meaning is that the origin of AI does not come from the crypto world, and in a broader sense, crypto is not the main battlefield of AI, but if the general development of AI Agent is not good, the attention to AI Agent will quickly dissipate, and the narrative of AI Agent will become a flash in the pan like many other narratives.

However, this time, within the visible range, it is indeed different. The main reasons are:

1. The general AI world has not entered the bubble falsification period, whether it is Nvidia, Microsoft, Google and other big companies, in their third quarter financial reports this year, they have unanimously increased their capital expenditures for 2025, and the top four companies alone will invest more than $170 billion in capital next year, with the only goal being AI.

2. From the development of the AI Agent, although there is currently no phenomenon-level product like chatgpt that has exploded the market, but from the actions of the big companies and the development of the industry, the vigorous momentum and capital betting are rising linearly, and there is a certain probability that a market-exploding AI Agent will appear in 2025.

3. From these two points, from the broad technological perspective, the topic and attention of AI and AI Agent are still and must be among the top market rankings, as mentioned at the beginning, attention is everything in the crypto world.

Here is the English translation:

From the technical framework of the AI Agent's implementation, its combination with Crypto will give birth to a key turning point breakthrough similar to the birth of Ethereum smart contracts. It is not just a technical bonus, but a more likely leap-forward economic paradigm shift, because it will fundamentally change the creation model of the attention economy.

The biggest challenge currently facing blockchain's Mass Adoption may be its complex operations and entry threshold. Putting aside the compliance pain points involved in fiat currency deposits/withdrawals, the difficulty and complexity of on-chain operations, wallets, etc. are at least several times that of Web2. If the natural language mode of the Ai Agent is adopted, a simple instruction, whether it is wallet management, screening the best DeFi investments, cross-chain operations, or automatically executing trading plans based on external market conditions, it not only greatly simplifies the operational difficulty, but also directly reduces the learning cost of new users by several levels. Furthermore, whether it is the creator economy, market sentiment monitoring, smart contract auditing, governance voting, AI autonomous DA, or even MEME issuance, the Agent can participate. Under certain predetermined conditions, it may be more serious, fair, and able to eliminate the influence of emotions than most people. From the narrative logic, the AI+Crypto brings: AI can make the trustworthy blockchain more intelligent, and blockchain can make the intelligent AI more trustworthy. The characteristic of blockchain is the immutability of data, and one of the major flaws of AI is precisely in data quality. If the constructed AI Agent can be trained on on-chain data and utilize its computing power, it is very likely to change the current incentive model. Looking further ahead, perhaps in the not-too-distant future, every crypto user will have a digital avatar that will help manage your token assets, social interactions, etc.; every project will have several AI Agents to assist in operations, from asset issuance, marketing, code construction, contract auditing, media operations, and even airdrop design and distribution, all of which can be assisted by AI. These long-term changes will change the creation model of attention, from larger-scale communities and humans to AI Agents. Of course, the above ideas are just long-term speculations. Returning to reality, the current AI Agent in the blockchain is still in an early, chaotic stage. Apart from the explosive popularity of AI MEME, the AI Agent is still in a stage where speculation outweighs building. There is currently no real AI Agent framework based on the characteristics of the blockchain. Even the pioneering ELIZA is only at the dialogue level and has not yet entered the core of the entire blockchain world. From the three levels of AI Agent - perception, decision-making, and execution - it needs to be rebuilt based on the decentralized characteristics and smart contract features to build a more systematic and underlying infrastructure, not to mention the various tool platforms, data privacy, transaction security, etc. Fortunately, whether it is the attention of top-tier capital like A16z to AI Agent, the mainstream narrative of AI Agent globally, or the amazing wealth effect of the AI MEME explosion, they have all laid a solid foundation for the development of AI Agent in the crypto world. In the attention economy of crypto, the current AI Agent has the attention of capital, the sustained heat of the broad narrative, typical cases of wealth effects, and the practical value of long-term construction. Perhaps we can be a little bolder and say, this time, it's really different! Passion!