AI Agents Don't Need Onboarding — and That Could Finally Solve Crypto's Adoption Problem!

Chappy Asel, former Apple engineer and founder of AI nonprofit The AI Collective, argues that autonomous software agents — not consumers — may be crypto's most natural user base. Speaking at Consensus Miami, Asel made the case that as AI agents increasingly make economic decisions on behalf of users and businesses, they will need exactly what crypto already offers: low-latency, programmable, always-on payment rails.

"When agents make the majority of financial decisions, how do they transact with each other?" Asel said. "You want very small, micro transactions. You want very low latency." Stablecoins with 24/7 settlement and smart contracts with programmable execution are, in his framing, the only logical infrastructure for machine-to-machine commerce at scale.

The thesis is still early. Most companies today rely on centralized APIs and conventional payment systems, and agentic…