Animoca Brands founder Yat Siu says AI will use crypto for transactions

Animoca Brands founder Yat Siu believes that crypto and artificial intelligence are interrelated.

“If we think about AIs transacting with each other as autonomous beings in the future, what currency they will transact in, it has to be crypto,” Siu told Financial News.

“In the future, 70-80% of transactions will happen through autonomous AI agents and the decentralised nature of crypto makes it a perfect match,” he added.

Siu, who also chairs Hong Kong-based Animoca Brands, founded the blockchain and NFT firm in 2014. The company received a valuation of $5.9bn in September 2022 after bagging $110m in a funding round.

“We didn’t get into this market because of bitcoin. Our emphasis has always been on NFTs and Web3,” Siu said.

The nascent crypto sector continues a volatile path, stymied by insufficient regulation. However, Web3 — a world characterised by open-source and interconnected decentralised applications powered by blockchain technology — looks set to overtake this, further bolstering the use of cryptocurrency as the preferred payment method.

Siu said that crypto, NFTs, and Web3 went through a massive hype in 2021, an issue he says now faces AI.

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“AI is going through the hype cycle which will eventually come down. For me, the most important thing is the promise that AI offers,” Siu told FN.

Interest in AI has skyrocketed since the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November last year. In July, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman launched Worldcoin, a project that integrates AI and crypto.

Siu said that the adoption of Web3 will rely heavily on the evolution of AI.

“Web3 is more like open internet. In today’s world, Web2 has become like a closed internet with a handful of companies controlling the data,” Siu said.

“Web3 firms are restructuring the internet,” he added.

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In July, Animoca Brands invested $30m in the Web3 payments application Hi. Siu told FN that the company has made a total of roughly 450 investments in Web3 startups.

Siu backed Asia and the Middle East for the next wave of Web3 growth.

“Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, and UAE are leading the way in terms of creating infrastructure for Web3 companies. Hong Kong is more aggressive. I believe it is in the national interest of countries to have a stronger Web3 infrastructure,” he said.

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When asked about the future of NFTs, Siu said that the market is “not dead”.

“We have passed the NFT hype cycle. NFTs are still doing volumes of around $1bn per month, that’s not too dead. The number of people joining the NFT ecosystem is still increasing on a net basis,” Siu said.

“Narrative around NFTs in the US is negative but that’s not the case in Asia and the Middle East. Overall, NFTs will grow as a utility because it’s the best way to manage our digital properties,” he added.

To contact the author of this story with feedback or news, email Bilal Jafar

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