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Key Takeaways
- Wood says her “follow the developers” framework may need to become “follow the agents” as AI agents take on a more active economic role.
- BlackRock sees stablecoins and blockchain protocols as possible machine-to-machine payment rails, and Chalom argues agent finance should not be controlled by a few firms.
- Stripe, Visa, Google and OpenAI are building rival agent payment methods, so tracking where agents transact could show whether crypto rails gain real usage.
ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood told investors they may need a new signal for spotting which technologies are gaining traction: following the spending activity of AI agents rather than just tracking which developers adopt a given tool.
Her comment, made during a panel discussion, points to a broader debate over what financial infrastructure will handle payments as AI agents increasingly act and transact on their own.
From “Follow the Developers” to “Follow the Agents”
Wood has long told investors to watch which tools software developers adopt as an early signal of where technology adoption is heading.
Speaking on a panel at Robinhood’s Summit in Houston, she said that framework may need an update as AI agents, software capable of carrying out tasks independently rather than simply answering questions or generating text, take on a more active economic role.
“We’re probably going to be talking more and more about ‘follow the agents.'”
As AI agents increasingly make independent choices about which software, services, and networks to use, Wood’s comment suggests their collective activity could offer investors another way to track where real demand is forming.
That shift raises a practical question: agents capable of taking action on a person’s behalf will also need a reliable way to pay for what they use.
A Former BlackRock Executive’s Case Against Concentrated Control
Joseph Chalom, co-CEO of SharpLink and former head of digital assets at BlackRock, argued in a social media post last month that the financial infrastructure underlying AI agents should not end up concentrated among a small number of banks or technology companies.
He wrote that a future filled with capable AI agents offers little practical benefit if a handful of firms control where that money is allowed to flow.
Chalom’s broader argument centers on permissions and portability rather than simply whether an agent can transact. He described a model in which a person might authorize an agent to spend up to a set limit, such as $500 toward booking a hotel, without granting unrestricted access to a full bank account. This while retaining the ability to revoke that authority and review a record of what the agent did.
He also argued users should be able to move an agent’s identity, financial permissions and transaction history between providers, similar to transferring a phone number between carriers, rather than becoming locked into a single company’s system.
Chalom pointed to open blockchains such as Ethereum as a potential shared financial layer that different AI agents, applications, and companies could use without requiring a single bank or technology platform to intermediate every transaction.
BlackRock Sees Stablecoins as Machine-to-Machine Payment Rails
BlackRock made a related argument in a paper published in September examining the overlap between AI and digital assets. The paper said AI agents could generate new demand for payment systems built specifically for machine-to-machine transactions, such as paying for an API call, purchasing data, or renting computing power without waiting for human approval at each step.
The asset manager pointed to stablecoins and blockchain-based payment protocols, capable of operating continuously and enabling software to send payments directly to other software, as one possible way to handle that demand.
Coinbase’s x402 protocol, designed to let automated systems pay for online services such as data or API access, is one example of infrastructure built for that purpose.
Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong pointed to early signs of agent-driven activity on the exchange’s own platform in a post on X, though he did not provide supporting figures.
“Grok is the leading client for agentic traders on Coinbase currently.”
Crypto Faces Competition From Established Payment Players
Crypto infrastructure is not the only option under development for agentic payments. Stripe, Visa, Google and OpenAI are each building their own methods for letting AI agents make purchases.
BlackRock’s paper noted that traditional payment systems are likely to remain significant players in this space rather than being displaced entirely by blockchain-based alternatives.
That competition gives Wood’s “follow the agents” framework a specific, testable dimension for crypto investors.
If AI agents become significant economic actors in their own right, tracking where their transactions actually occur could help indicate whether stablecoins and blockchain payment rails are gaining genuine real-world usage. It could show whether agent-driven commerce continues to flow primarily through traditional payment networks instead.
