Binance’s Ella Zhang argues that the next phase of crypto is less about “everything gets a token” and more about crypto becoming the invisible rails for AI agents, identity, payments, ownership, and select real-world asset markets. She thinks the strongest near-term signal is agentic payments and wallet/permission infrastructure, while tokenized assets are clearly gaining traction but still face custody and liquidity friction.
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This conversation centers on the convergence of crypto, AI, and tokenization, with Ella Zhang framing the core thesis as a shift from crypto as a standalone domain to crypto as enabling infrastructure for other technologies. Looking back to 2018, she says Binance Labs’ mindset was largely “crypto, crypto is the biggest thing ever,” but in hindsight the better lens was to understand that major innovation tends to happen through convergence — she compares it to steam engines plus railways, or electricity plus assembly lines. Her reflection is that if she could rewind, she would have made more early bets on AI names like Nvidia rather than staying too narrow on crypto alone. The most important emerging use case, in her view, is agentic AI with payment and execution capability. She says AI agents need more than intelligence; they need to execute, transact, own assets, and gain trust. …
Near term, the actionable setup is agentic AI infrastructure — wallets, permissions, identity, and payment flows — while tokenized assets remain a secondary but real catalyst. The main tactical risk is overpaying for narrative before usage data proves the rails are actually being adopted.
Over the next few months, the base case is a gradual expansion of AI-agent use cases into payments and ownership, alongside more tokenized asset experiments that test custody and liquidity. Confirmation would come from rising real-world transaction volumes and institutional deployment; failure would look like stalled usage and thin liquidity.
The structural thesis is that crypto becomes embedded infrastructure for AI and mainstream finance rather than a stand-alone token economy. If that regime shift persists, the biggest winners may be equity-led platform businesses using blockchain under the hood, with token issuance becoming optional rather than mandatory.
Major innovation usually happens through convergence, not inside a single isolated technology domain.
She argues that transformative shifts occur when technologies combine with enabling infrastructure, using steam/railways and electricity/assembly lines as examples.
AI agents need execution, transactions, asset ownership, and trust — not just intelligence.
This is her core justification for why blockchain is necessary for the agentic AI era.
Blockchain can make AI interactions intent-based, reducing crypto’s usability friction.
She says users should tell AI what they want, and AI should handle the wallet/protocol execution.
Looking back at Ella in 2018 versus now, what would you have gotten wrong about where capital would be flowing by 2026?
Ella reflects that in 2018, the mindset at Binance Labs was crypto-only. She says if they had thought more holistically about how innovation happens at the convergence of technologies (e.g., steam + railway, electricity + assembly line), they would have invested in early AI bets like Nvidia. Her 'wrong' was being too narrowly focused on crypto alone.
What is exciting you about the Web3 AI convergence at Y Combinator, and what specific verticals are you looking at?
Ella describes two dimensions of convergence: TradFi + DeFi (stablecoins going mainstream, tokenized stocks on-chain, MicroStrategy-type adoption) and technology convergence where AI, biology, and blockchain enable each other. She explains that AI agents need blockchain for execution, asset ownership, and trust, while AI makes blockchain usable via intent-based interfaces. Over time, blockchain becomes the invisible identity/incentive/ownership layer and AI becomes the interface layer.
Between tokenized products, DeFi, settlements, and AI agents, which one do you believe will be the next big thing this year?
Ella says agentic payment is taking off and that CZ had a vision early last year with a mind map of 20-30 items showing AI would change how people trade on crypto and the UI/UX of Binance and DApps. She highlights intent-based decision making by AI agents eliminating the need for interfaces, and blockchain protocols enabling AI identity, wallets, and asset ownership so agents can execute. She also notes data ownership via ZK proofs as another key area of investment.
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