Crypto Designed for AI Agents, Not Humans, According to Alchemy CEO

The existing financial framework was not created with machines in mind, but rather around human limitations such as geographical constraints, sleep patterns, and physical presence. However, as AI agents start to participate in economic activities, this human-centric design is becoming a hindrance, according to Nikil Viswanathan, co-founder of the crypto firm Alchemy. 'It can be argued that cryptocurrency was built for AI agents, not humans,' Viswanathan stated. The discrepancy is evident everywhere: banks have limited hours due to human schedules, payments are tied to countries because people reside in them, and credit cards rely on physical identity and presence. AI agents, on the other hand, operate differently as they do not sleep, have no physical location, and do not use banks or credit cards. Moreover, they are increasingly involved in transactions. 'All transactions for agents are online and inherently global,' Viswanathan said in an interview. This is where cryptocurrency starts to appear as the native infrastructure for a new type of economic actor, rather than an alternative financial system. Alchemy, a crypto infrastructure company, provides developers with the necessary tools and services to build blockchain-based applications, including APIs, node infrastructure, and data services. Traditional finance is based on the assumption of friction, which is normal for humans but impractical for AI agents. Agents require seamless, borderless transactions at any time, often in small increments, and need programmability and direct control over money via code. Cryptocurrency offers exactly that: a global, always-on financial layer where value can move as easily as data. 'Cryptocurrency is the global infrastructure for money that agents need,' Viswanathan said. The complexity of cryptocurrency, including seed phrases, private keys, and interacting with code, is what makes it powerful for machines. Unlike humans, agents operate natively in code and read in zeros and ones. 'Agents' native language is zeros and ones, which is also the language of cryptocurrency,' he said. For years, cryptocurrency has tried to become more human-friendly, but its underlying architecture was never built for humans. Viswanathan compared the shift from crypto tools being built primarily for humans to crypto tools being used by AI agents to the shift from the postal system to the internet. 'Email is far more powerful than the postal system because it is designed for computers,' Viswanathan said. 'Cryptocurrency is similar.' Moving forward, AI agents will sit on top of crypto infrastructure, handling complexity automatically, managing wallets, executing transactions, and optimizing capital flows in real-time, allowing people to control their funds more easily. 'You can write code to manage a crypto wallet, but you cannot write code to manage a bank account in the same way,' Viswanathan said. The result will be a financial system that is more global, programmable, and autonomous. Viswanathan envisions a layered future with traditional finance and cryptocurrency as the base, an agent layer operating on top, and a human interface above that. 'Just like computers operate the internet and humans use it, agents will operate finance,' he said.