Crypto's True Intent: Designed for AI Agents, Not Humans, Claims Alchemy CEO

The current financial system was not designed with machines in mind, instead, it was built around human constraints such as geographical location, sleep patterns, and physical presence. However, with the emergence of AI agents as economic participants, this human-centric design is becoming a hindrance, according to Nikil Viswanathan, co-founder of crypto firm Alchemy. Viswanathan argues that crypto was, in fact, built for AI agents, not humans. The traditional financial system is filled with limitations, such as banking hours, country-specific payments, and credit cards that require physical identity and presence. AI agents, on the other hand, operate differently, they do not sleep, have no physical location, and do not use traditional banking systems or credit cards. They transact online, globally, and without interruption. This is where crypto starts to look like the native infrastructure for a new kind of economic actor, rather than an alternative financial system. Alchemy, a crypto infrastructure company, provides the necessary tools and services for developers to build blockchain-based applications, enabling companies to create and scale on-chain products without managing the complexity of blockchain systems themselves. Traditional finance is based on the assumption of friction, with cross-border payments involving currency exchanges, intermediaries, delays, and fees, which is normal for humans but unusable for AI agents. Agents require seamless, programmable, and direct control over money via code, without relying on physical infrastructure or identity, which is exactly what crypto offers. The complexity that has long made crypto difficult for humans, such as seed phrases and private keys, is what makes it powerful for machines. Unlike humans, agents operate natively in code, and crypto's underlying architecture was never really built for humans. Viswanathan compares the shift from crypto tools being built for humans to being used by AI agents to the shift from the postal system to the internet. Looking forward, AI agents will sit on top of crypto infrastructure, handling complexity, managing wallets, executing transactions, and optimizing capital flows in real-time, allowing people to control their funds more easily. The result would be a more global, programmable, and autonomous financial system, with a layered future: traditional finance and crypto as the base, an agent layer operating on top, and a human interface above that.