SAN FRANCISCO, CA – As artificial intelligence advances rapidly, some crypto executives believe it could ultimately become the force driving the widespread adoption of blockchain infrastructure. Some people don’t believe this leap is that simple.
During a recent panel discussion at NEARCON 2026, Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley described AI as a “non-stop freight train” and argued that the pace of development is unlike anything experienced by cryptocurrencies. “AI is currently achieving the equivalent of a quarter of the way through the roadmap every two weeks,” he said, suggesting that predictions based on previous crypto adoption cycles may already be outdated. “We need to dump the last six years of data and start a new slice of data from the last six months.”
For Horsley, the implication is that public blockchains may benefit disproportionately from the rise of AI. “If there’s one area that would absolutely benefit from greater adoption of AI, it would be public blockchain and crypto assets,” he said.
He suggested that crypto-native tools could have practical benefits once autonomous agents start acting on behalf of users. “Agents are obviously not going to want to authorize OpenClaw with their credit cards… They’re going to want to fund it with stablecoins. They’re going to want to trade in secret,” Horsley said, noting that stablecoins and on-chain infrastructure are potential guardrails for machine-driven activity.
Diogo Monica, general partner at Haun Ventures and co-founder of Anchorage Digital, pushed back against the assumption that agent commerce automatically requires new rails.
“For the foreseeable future, agent payment commerce could become exactly the same as payment commerce today,” Monika said. “You’re saying that no superhuman intelligence can make a payment using today’s payment rails, today’s credit cards, today’s instant payments, or figure it out on its own.”
“You can’t say that AGI is coming and the agents are going to be very smart… and you can also say that they’re not going to be smart enough to understand different systems,” he added.
Still, Monika acknowledged that there is more collaboration between technologies. “AI creates digital abundance, and cryptocurrencies and digital scarcity. These are actually complementary technologies,” he said, adding that crypto privacy and verification tools could help mitigate some of the risks posed by AI.
Whether blockchain will become the default rail for autonomous commerce remains an open question. But as AI accelerates, the debate over the role of cryptocurrencies in its future is clearly intensifying.
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