Crypto Agent pullback of more than 70%, is it a bubble burst or a chance to catch the bottom?

This article is written by BCH Alpha DAO researcher

Since January 27th, DeepSeek has been popular worldwide for its low-cost training mode, and the global AI concept stocks have experienced panic selling. NVIDIA’s stock directly plummeted by 17%. The Crypto Agent track was also not spared. As of today, the overall market value of the Crypto Agent track has dropped from $12 billion to below $6 billion. Most of the blue-chip Agent tokens, such as Virtual, Ai16Z, ARC, Griffain, Aixbt, FAI, etc., have experienced a decline of over 70%, and many Agent concept tokens have dropped by more than 90%.

There is currently a lot of pessimism in the market about the Agent track, and many people directly deny the track, believing that Crypto Agent is just a short-term speculative concept, and now the bubble has completely burst.

Will the Agent track be as sluggish as NFTs in 2022 and inscriptions in 2023?

Is it really going to perish in the cradle before the Agent track, which was highly anticipated by the industry just one month ago, has grown strong?

I have been paying attention to the development of the Agent field, and I have already written about the development and ultimate ending of Crypto Agents, so I won’t go into it in this article. My view on the Agent field has remained unchanged: Crypto Agents is a big field with long-term growth potential. This field will intersect and develop in parallel with the traditional AI industry, and eventually grow unique Agents in the Crypto field. Therefore, Crypto Agents are by no means a short-term speculative concept, nor will they be a flash in the pan like NFTs and inscriptions. After a brief period of rest, the Crypto Agent field will quickly recover. Crypto Agents are still the most worth paying attention to field in 2025.

To determine whether a Crypto track has long-term growth value, I believe we only need to answer three questions:

1. Does this track really solve problems and create value?

2. Has Crypto played an irreplaceable role in this track?

3. Is there a sustained inflow of talent and capital into the track?

In the following, we will explore the above three questions to discuss whether Crypto Agent has long-term growth value, and ultimately answer whether Crypto Agent is a super track worth long-term attention.

What problems does Crypto Agent solve and what value does it create?

The essence of Agent is an agent, which means that Agent replaces humans to complete a series of work or specific tasks. Agent can replace humans with higher costs and can do better and more efficient than humans. Therefore, the main value of Agent in various fields is cost reduction and efficiency improvement. Therefore, the maximum value of Agent in the Crypto field will also be cost reduction and efficiency improvement.

For example, in the field of scientific paper auditing, Agent can replace humans in making scientific paper corrections, and even do it more accurately, faster, and at a lower cost than humans. #YNE is a very successful case.

For example, Agent can replace investment research personnel in the field of investment research and analysis, and #AIXBT和#REI is a good case.

For example, Agent can replace people in the field of brand marketing to carry out continuous 7*24 hours of brand exposure and community interaction, #Luna is a good example.

For example, in the DeFi field, Agents can replace humans to make smarter and more rational financial decisions, and even significantly reduce the entry barriers of DeFi, thereby attracting more funds into the DeFi space. Therefore, the DeFAI sub-track has emerged, although the author prefers to call it DeFi Agent applications. Here, #Buzz is a good example.

For example, the application of Agent in the Saas field is to replace programmers to deploy apps with Agent, which is to disrupt the current Saas field with Agent. This is one of the biggest application directions of Agent, and this statement is not from me, but from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s words (‘I think the notion of business applications might go away in the era of intelligent agents.’). In the Crypto field, #Griffain is a good example.

The examples above are more focused on the specific application direction of Crypto Agent. Although Crypto Agent applications are not perfect now, and even not smart enough (traditional Agent applications are the same), human AI technology is developing rapidly, and training costs are significantly reduced. The outbreak and popularization of large-scale Agent applications are only a matter of time. And Crypto Agent applications can also be rapidly iterated and upgraded to further reduce costs and increase efficiency.

Of course, in addition to the Crypto Agent application, the current Crypto Agent infrastructure is also very important, such as various Agent frameworks Virtual, ARC, Ai16Z, ALCH, etc. And infrastructure like #REI、#FAI that explores the deep integration of Crypto and Agent is also worth paying attention to.

Summary: The essence of an Agent is an intermediary, and the value it brings is cost reduction and efficiency improvement. The problem solved by the Crypto Agent application is to use a more intelligent Agent to replace humans in work, bringing the same value of cost reduction and efficiency improvement, while the tokens issued by the Agent will also play a role as the cost of the application within the ecosystem.

Second, has Crypto played an irreplaceable role in the Agent track?

During the early stage of Crypto Agent’s explosion, I once wrote an article explaining the relationship between Crypto and Agent, as well as the ultimate development of Crypto Agent. The original text is as follows:

The core point of the article is that Crypto is not only the currency of AI, but also the infrastructure that supports the identity, asset accounts, asset settlement, and other needs of Agents (silicon-based humans). Agents without Crypto will lose their independent and trustworthy social attributes. The development of Agents is inseparable from Crypto, and Agents will also become the largest service object of Crypto.

Here I will briefly summarize three points:

1. In the future, the mainstream Agent will extend in two directions. One is the Agent application controlled by individuals or companies, which will serve as human tools and exist based on human will. The other direction is the Agent based on Crypto to build identity and account systems, which are more independent and autonomous, with free social relationships and business networks, and closer to ‘silicon-based people’. Therefore, these Agents must be built based on Crypto, which endows these Agents with identity and asset account systems based on private keys, because no sovereign country or organization will grant these Agents a borderless identity, except for Crypto.

2. Agents will become the largest user group of Crypto, and Agents will also contribute to the vigorous development of Crypto in return. In the future, the number of Agents on the chain will surpass the number of human users. Crypto and Agents will depend on each other and achieve mutual success in the long run.

3. The current consensus in the mainstream AI industry is that the large model mode that relies solely on feeding data and computing power cannot generate true AI intelligence, and making Agent based on large models imitate human communication and interaction, that is, making Agents produce independent and autonomous interactive communication with other Agents, relying on emergence to generate intelligence, is the current AI exploration direction that is highly expected, and this is also the path to AGI exploration. Based on this background, truly independent and autonomous Agents must be built based on Crypto. Therefore, Crypto will play a long-term and irreplaceable role in human exploration of AI.

Summary: Crypto is the infrastructure where Agent has independent and autonomous identity and account system, and it is a necessary infrastructure. The number of on-chain Agents will surpass the number of real human users, and Crypto and Agents depend on each other and achieve each other. Crypto will play a long-term and irreplaceable role in the human exploration of AI development.

Is there a continuous influx of talent and capital into the Agent track?

As is known to all, Agent is not a unique concept in the crypto industry, but the most mainstream development direction in the global AI industry. The general consensus at present is that 2025 will be the year of Agent, and in the next 5-10 years, Agent will experience continuous explosive growth.

Although DeepSeek’s low-cost training mode has had a huge impact on the AI industry, especially the AI chip industry, in the short term, these are all short-term effects. According to Jevons paradox (technological efficiency improvements will stimulate demand )), after the impact of DeepSeek, the AI and Agent fields will usher in a larger scale of outbreak and growth.

Because the cost of AI training has dropped significantly, the research and development costs of agents have also decreased exponentially, which will greatly promote the outbreak and popularization of agent applications, and a large number of ordinary families will also be able to use agents on a large scale. Just like the reduction in the production cost of smartphones has greatly increased the global internet penetration rate, further promoting the development of the mobile interactive internet economy.

Similarly, the continued development of the mainstream Agent industry will continue to provide creativity and development nutrients for Crypto Agents, and the Crypto Agent market will long enjoy the spillover dividends of the mainstream AI industry’s development.

The more free and efficient asset issuance and fundraising methods of Crypto will continue to attract outstanding AI entrepreneurs from around the world to enter the Crypto field. The Crypto Agent track will be able to continue to accommodate the talent and capital overflow from the traditional AI industry.

In 2025, we will see more and more professional talents in the AI field enter the Crypto field, which will bring sustained talent and capital inflows to the Crypto Agent track, thereby driving the entire track to a scale of over 100 billion US dollars.

Summary:

This article discusses whether the Crypto Agent track has long-term growth potential from three dimensions, explores the interaction between Crypto and Agent, and the impact of mainstream AI industry development on the Crypto Agent track. The conclusion is that Crypto Agent meets the criteria for long-term growth track judgment. After the Crypto market stabilizes and the impact of DeepSeek, Crypto Agent will quickly recover and usher in long-term explosive growth. As the saying goes, Crypto Agent is still the most worthy track to pay attention to in 2025 and even this bull market.

Risk Warning:

This article represents the personal views of the BCH Alpha researcher. All viewpoints and reasoning are based on personal knowledge system judgments. The mention of Agent tokens in the article does not constitute investment advice. The crypto market is a highly volatile industry, so please make investment judgments based on personal understanding.