Autonomous artificial intelligence agents will soon be spending and earning money on their own – and that could make blockchain and crypto the “next big AI trade”, according to a senior executive at global asset manager Franklin Templeton.
Sandy Kaul, who leads digital asset and industry advisory work at Franklin Templeton, argues that so‐called “agentic AI” will need ultra‐cheap, programmable payment systems to move tiny amounts of money between machines – something she says existing banking networks are poorly equipped to provide.
Her view echoes that of Jeremy Allaire, chief executive of US digital payments company Circle, who says AI and blockchain are on course to merge into a single, software‐driven economy in which programmes “transact, coordinate and exchange value autonomously”.
From chatbots to economic agents
The current wave of AI has been dominated by chatbots and content tools used by humans. Kaul says the next phase will see software agents acting with far greater independence – subscribing to services, buying data, paying for computing power and receiving income for tasks, often in fractions of a cent.
That shift, she suggests, will strain traditional payment rails, which are designed for fewer, larger human‐initiated transactions and carry relatively high fees and settlement frictions.
By contrast, public blockchains allow near‐instant settlement, global reach and programmable “smart contracts” that can automatically execute payments according to pre‐set rules. For AI systems interacting constantly with one another, Kaul argues, these properties could prove essential.
“Agentic AI will require low-cost, programmable payment rails for machine-to-machine micropayments,” she says, adding that such requirements position blockchains more favourably than conventional financial infrastructure.
Convergence of AI and blockchain
Allaire has long promoted the idea that AI agents will operate natively on blockchain networks, using digital assets such as stablecoins – crypto tokens pegged to traditional currencies – to move value.
His thesis is that in an environment where software can initiate and complete economic activity without human intervention, blockchains provide a neutral, auditable record of transactions while stablecoins act as the primary settlement asset.
Kaul’s analysis aligns closely with this outlook. She contends that as AI systems gain the ability not just to process information but to participate in markets, there will be increasing demand for networks that can securely handle continuous, high‐volume, low‐value payments.
Investors positioning for the next phase of the AI trade, she suggests, should therefore consider not only chipmakers and cloud providers, but also the underlying payment and settlement technologies that AI agents are likely to use.
TRON’s growing role in the stablecoin economy
Recent data from the second quarter underlines how some blockchain networks are already becoming central to digital payments.
On TRON, a leading blockchain focused on fast and inexpensive transfers, the share of the overall stablecoin market rose to 28.7% in Q2, according to figures cited alongside Kaul’s analysis. The supply of Tether’s USDT stablecoin issued on TRON hit an all‐time high of $89bn over the same period.
TRON also generated $89m in protocol fees in the quarter, placing it second only to derivatives platform Hyperliquid in this metric, while its native token TRX gained 3%.
Supporters say these figures demonstrate both heavy transactional use and growing institutional interest – trends that could make such networks attractive to AI developers seeking reliable payment backbones for their agents.
The report notes evidence of “deepening institutional & agentic reach” on TRON, suggesting that both traditional financial players and early AI‐driven systems are beginning to use the network more intensively.
A new frontier for investors
The argument from Kaul and Allaire implies that if AI agents become a major economic force, the blockchains and digital assets they use could see substantial growth in activity and value.
For now, the vision of fully autonomous “money bots” remains largely prospective. But as AI capabilities advance and the volume of machine‐to‐machine interactions increases, the choice of payment infrastructure – and the role of crypto networks within it – is likely to move higher up the agenda for both technologists and investors.
