Brian Armstrong, CEO of major U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, unveiled a new vision on the 27th for a financial infrastructure tailored to AI agents, which he calls “Agentic Finance (AiFi).” He expressed the view that the rise of AI will not diminish the importance of crypto assets (virtual currencies) but rather enhance it, positioning this as a core business area for Coinbase going forward.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Armstrong noted, “I often hear people say if you’re in crypto you should pivot to AI, but that’s the wrong way to look at the world.” He emphasized that just because AI is a megatrend does not mean crypto becomes less important; “in fact, it makes crypto even more important.”
Armstrong positioned crypto assets as general-purpose infrastructure akin to electricity or the internet—not an industry competing with new technology, but a foundation that supports the growth of other technologies. He specifically pointed to the prospect of AI agents emerging as independent economic actors in the future.
“AI agents can’t open bank accounts, and they can’t handle payments that take days to settle,” Armstrong stated, expressing his conviction that programmable crypto assets, which operate 24/7/365, are precisely the payment mechanism AI agents will need. He predicted that AI agents will “eventually conduct far more transactions per day than all of humanity combined.”
The core of the AiFi vision is a financial paradigm where AI agents autonomously hold funds, make payments, raise capital, and manage assets. According to Armstrong, AI agents will be capable not only of paying for goods and services but also of executing trades, providing financial advice, and even fundraising or borrowing for new projects. He anticipates that, in the future, AI agents will eventually handle all personal finance tasks, including tax planning, portfolio rebalancing, and bill payments.
Coinbase is already building the concrete infrastructure for this vision. The company’s proprietary payment protocol, “x402,” operates on “Base,” an Ethereum Layer 2 blockchain, and has surpassed 100 million cumulative transactions just nine months after launch. Amazon and Google have also adopted this payment standard, with adoption reportedly expanding.
“x402 protocol, Base, and the USD-pegged stablecoin USDC are already processing the vast majority of AI agent payments today,” Armstrong said, concluding, “Welcome to the world of Agentic Finance. This is what Coinbase is building.”
The convergence of AI agents and crypto assets is rapidly becoming a hot topic within the industry. For autonomously operating software to engage in economic activity, a mechanism that bypasses the constraints of the traditional financial system—such as business hours, identity verification, and processing delays—is essential. A payment infrastructure combining blockchain technology and stablecoins is emerging as a powerful solution. Coinbase’s AiFi vision can be seen as a strategic move to get ahead of this trend.