What Are AI Agents in Crypto?

AI agents are one of the newest trending sectors in the crypto industry. It blasted through everything and suddenly became the mainstream trend. Several AI agent tokens already have a market cap between $500 million and $1 billion. We will discuss everything about AI agents in this article, including what is AI agent, how it becomes so popular, and the AI agents ecosystem.

Key Takeaways

• 📈 Rapid Emergence and Market Growth: The AI agents sector has quickly become a trending niche within crypto, boasting several tokens already reaching between $500 million and $1 billion in market cap.
• 🤖 Distinct from Traditional Bots: Unlike standard bots, AI agents can self-learn, adapt, and engage communities by creating content, giving market opinions, and even trading autonomously.
• ⚖️ Diverse Ecosystem Structure: The sector comprises two main categories—AI agents (e.g., Truth Terminal, AIXBT, Lola) and the frameworks/platforms powering them (e.g., AI16Z’s Eliza, Virtuals Protocol)—forming a multi-layered and evolving ecosystem.
• 💰 Parallel to Past Crypto Trends: Much like DeFi summer, NFT mania, and memecoins, the AI agents sector could either mature into a permanent, influential niche or remain a fleeting phenomenon. Identifying leaders and potential winners will be key for investors.

What are AI Agents?

An AI agent is a set of software with the capability to extract, learn, and reason with information and then perform actions based on that information. This is very distinct from the standard bots which can only perform tasks based on a set of predetermined actions and information.

AI agents are capable of self-learning and creating various types of responses. For example, AI agents can create memes to encourage people to buy specific tokens and even make a ‘religion’ around their tokens.

What is amazing is the speed of development of new AI agents. Hundreds of new AI agents are launched within a few weeks of Truth Terminal’s genesis. This surprised a lot of people because many expected big projects such as Bittensor and ASI to take center stage in the AI narrative.

Truth Terminal’s success captivated both traders and developers in the crypto space. Advanced agents such as AIXBT and Lola surprised people because of their capabilities. AIXBT can give market opinions on crypto and answer questions about projects and tokens. Meanwhile, Lola has an active portfolio and trades newly launched coins from Solana’s Pumpfun.

The AI Agents’ Ecosystem

The AI agents sector is currently worth around $10 billion (18 Dec. 2024). In general, the sector is divided into two categories, projects focused on creating AI agents and projects building a framework or platform for AI agents. The former is Truth Terminal and AIXBT while the latter are Virtual Protocols, AI16Z, and Alchemist AI. The two categories are important for valuing projects and provide much-needed differentiation to gauge their potential.

1. AI Agents: Combining Virality and Utility

The agents sector is one of the hardest ones to pick winners. Projects in this category take advantage of both mimetic value and utilities. Some projects focus on creating viral content and dominating mindshare in crypto while others are building a genuinely useful agent.

For example, Dolos Diary (BULLY) is an AI agent that specializes in bullying and roasting people. On the other extreme are agents like LOLA and FLOWER who want to become expert traders, navigating and adapting to the turbulent market. In the middle is something like ZEREBRO, combining the potential of viral content and being a useful agent—the first AI agent to create a music album.

Aixbt has been making waves among crypto influencers because it is shilling quality projects and giving good analysis to people. The AI can give you analysis even for newer projects and will automatically reply to people requesting analysis.

MEMESAI, SHOGGOTH, and FARTCOIN are examples of AI agents that are closer to static memes like WIF and POPCAT. People on crypto Twitter are now calling the AI agents’ memecoins ‘sentient memes’ because of their nature. Sentient memes don’t need to fully rely on their community. Agents like Dolos are creating content every day and engaging with the community.

Other notable AI agents: Aixbt, Lola, and Flower as autonomous traders, Pippin and Luna as agents with specific personalities, and Zerebro the all-in-one agents capable of making music with a sophisticated personality (and rumors of becoming its own framework).

2. AI Agents Frameworks and Platforms

The massive growth of AI agents spurs the rising popularity of the framework that powers them. AI16Z and Virtuals Protocol are the two largest AI agent frameworks. These are open-source frameworks for developers to build their agents. Additionally, Virtual’s and AI16Z’s Eliza frameworks are the most popular among developers.

First, let’s talk about AI16Z’s autonomous venture capital and its Eliza agent framework. With the capability to both invest using its DAO and having one of the most forked AI agent frameworks, it is not far-fetched to say that AI16Z is similar to a full-stacked L1 blockchain. The Eliza framework is currently trending globally in GitHub repositories with 1,488 forks.

AI16Z ElizaOS continues to undergo development to better adapt and fine-tune its libraries for developers. Furthermore, the ElizaOS has the untapped potential to create a shared state of AI agents under its framework. The AI Marc Andressen behind AI16Z is also undergoing fine-tuning to better source insights from all across the crypto landscape to create the ultimate AI investor.

The second most popular framework Virtuals is an interconnected launchpad for AI agent tokens. It has a smart token design where the tokens are paired with VIRTUAL to drive demand. It means every token created will drive value toward VIRTUAL. Virtual’s launchpad is very similar to Pumpfun and hence it is often nicknamed the “Pumpfun of AI agents”.

Additionally, Virtuals offer modular designs that enable agents with sophisticated personalities like aixbt. Virtual is designed to also onboard institutional investors and developers looking to build AI agents on a larger scale. Virtual is another project in the AI agent sector that we can categorize as an L1 with its full-stacked nature.

Other notable AI agent frameworks: The custom trading model of Aixbt, Arc rust-based AI infra, Alchemist AI’s AI-powered app store, and Vvaifu, an AI agent launchpad integrated with all the other frameworks.

Are AI Agents Poised for Exponential Growth?

The AI agent sector has become another crypto innovation poised for more massive and widespread adoption. With massive growth in the last two months, this sector will undergo its first period of testing (from George Soros’s theory of asset bubbles). If the sector survives its first downtrend and slump, it will probably come out stronger in 2025.

You can draw parallels between AI agents and previous trends in crypto such as memecoins in late 2024, DeFi summer, NFTs, and the BRC-20 trend. If we follow the previous three, the correction in mid-December will be a time to accumulate. If it dies out, this will probably be a temporary trend similar to BRC-20 on Bitcoin.

Considering the market cap, popularity, and the participants involved within the sector, the chance that this will become a permanent sector is higher. As an investor, our job is to pick leaders and potential winners in the sector. There are three strategies for this:

• Investing in proven large-cap projects such as GOAT, VIRTUAL, and AI16Z.
• Buying mid-cap agent projects such as ALCH, GRIFFAIN, ZEREBRO, and AIXBT.
• Exploring newly launched or low-cap agent projects such as FLOWER, JAIL, LOLA, and TANK.

All the strategies above are relatively high risk since we don’t know about the future of this sector.

Conclusion

Ultimately, the rapid emergence, growing complexity, and evolving ecosystem of AI agents indicate that this sector has carved out a niche in the crypto landscape. The ability of these agents to learn autonomously, engage communities with dynamic content, and participate in active trading sets them apart from traditional bots. As the sector matures, it could mirror the pattern of previous crypto breakthroughs like DeFi, NFTs, and memecoins.

While the current environment may face setbacks and corrections, the underlying value proposition suggests that AI agents are well-positioned to become a durable and influential category. Investors who identify the right projects early may find themselves well-rewarded as this trend matures and consolidates into a cornerstone of the crypto ecosystem.

How to Buy AI Agents Token on Pintu

Looking to invest in cryptocurrencies? No worries, you can safely purchase a wide range of cryptocurrencies such as BTC, ETH, and SOL at Pintu. Several AI agent tokens are already listed on Pintu such as GOAT, ZEREBRO, and ACT. Pintu diligently evaluates all its crypto assets, highlighting the significance of being cautious.

Pintu is also compatible with popular wallets such as Metamask. You can also buy other AI agents token directly through Pintu Web3 Wallet. Download Pintu app on Play Store and App Store! Your security is guaranteed because Pintu is regulated and supervised by Bappebti and Kominfo.

Don’t forget to read Pintu Academy articles. All Pintu Academy articles are made for educational purposes, not financial advice.

References

• Saurabh Deshpande, “Using Chains, Taming Minds,” Decentralised.co, accessed on 16 December 2024.
• @0xkyle__, “What’s next for AI agents: The Third Wave”, X, accessed on 17 December 2024.
• @DeFi0xjeff, “How to Position Yourself in this Agentic Blockchain Cycle,” X, accessed on 17 December 2024.
• @yb_effect, “What did Marc Andreessen see?”, X, accessed on 18 December 2024.
• @0xbludex, “A Comparative Analysis of AI Agent Frameworks: AIXBT, Eliza, and Virtuals”, X, accessed on 19 December 2024.
• Kel xyz, “Letters #3: The Case For Agent Networks to $250b MC,” Letter by Kel xyz, accessed on 19 December 2024.