AI Agents Poised to Dominate Decentralized Finance Transactions

AI agents have emerged as a hot topic in Web3 circles, sparking ambitious visions of autonomous entities managing capital, risk, and strategy across decentralized protocols. These systems promise to outperform humans in execution and free users from micromanaging their digital assets. However, the reality is that the infrastructure for these agents is still in its early stages, and the sector must move beyond hype to deliver long-term value.

The Current State of AI Agents

While the term "AI agent" has taken many forms, embedding these agents into blockchain environments has amplified expectations. Projects like Fetch have expressed optimism, stating that agent-based systems represent an immense opportunity. However, real use cases remain limited, and the focus has shifted to building robust infrastructure.

Key Players in AI Agent Infrastructure

Several foundational projects are leading the charge:

• Giza: Advances verifiable on-chain inference using zero-knowledge machine learning.
• Axal: Prioritizes execution integrity with runtime verification systems.
• Theoriq: Explores decentralized intelligence through AI swarms.

These projects address the fragmentation of AI agents in DeFi, where isolated operations create inefficiencies. The proposed solution—Agentic DeFi—envisions intelligent agent swarms that collaborate across tasks and chains.

The Bottleneck: Infrastructure, Not Intelligence

The consensus is that the bottleneck isn't intelligence but efficient infrastructure. AI agents need modular environments to execute safely, adapt intelligently, and remain accountable. As noted in a recent analysis, "Without blockchain’s inherent transparency and security, there is no trusted foundation for AI agents".

The Path Forward

The vision of AI agents running vaults, rebalancing portfolios, or participating in governance is achievable but requires:

• DeFi frameworks for agents
• Dynamic risk controls
• Composable liquidity tooling

Projects like Giza, Axal, and Theoriq are not competing but complementing each other, each solving different layers of the same problem. The future of AI agents in DeFi hinges on interoperability, coordination, and modular environments designed for dynamic behavior.

"AI agents don’t just need intelligence; they need infrastructure."