AI agents will become the "killer use case" for blockchain payments: Franklin Templeton analysis
AI-powered intelligent agents could become the "killer use case" that brings blockchain into the mainstream of consumer payments. This conclusion follows an analysis by Sandy Kaul, Head of Digital Assets and Innovation at Franklin Templeton.
Why Traditional Infrastructure Won't Cope
The key problem with classic payment systems is high fees, settlement delays, and the mandatory involvement of humans. In the era of agentic AI, where programs not only respond to queries but independently execute chains of actions (purchasing data, paying for computations, calling paid APIs), these limitations become critical. Blockchain, on the other hand, offers infrastructure with low fees, high throughput, and instant settlement without intermediaries.
Numbers That Speak for Themselves
Forecasts from Bain & Company indicate that by 2030, AI agents could drive 15–25% of all e-commerce sales in the US. McKinsey & Company's estimate is even more ambitious: agentic commerce will "orchestrate" between $3 and $5 trillion in global consumer transactions. This is a colossal volume that will require a completely different payment architecture.
A comparison of network throughput conducted by Franklin Templeton clearly demonstrates the gap: Bitcoin processes about 7 TPS, Ethereum roughly 75 TPS, while Aptos achieves 12,933 TPS, Solana 6,284 TPS, and BNB Chain 3,252 TPS. For context: Visa processes 1,700–10,000 transactions per second in normal mode, but final settlement takes 1–3 business days. Blockchain solves this problem at the protocol level.
Which Assets Will Benefit
The growth of agent payments will inevitably increase demand for the native tokens of the networks where these operations are conducted. Kaul cites SOL and ETH as key examples. This is logical: the more transactions AI agents perform, the higher the network utilization and, consequently, the value of its internal asset.
Infrastructure Is Already Being Built
Significantly, major players are already building the necessary infrastructure. In July, the Linux Foundation announced the launch of the x402 Foundation, which includes 40 participants, including AWS, Google, Mastercard, Visa, Coinbase, Stripe, Circle, Shopify, the Solana Foundation, and the Stellar Development Foundation. Google, in turn, introduced the open Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), and for Web3 scenarios, developed the A2A x402 extension in collaboration with Coinbase, the Ethereum Foundation, and MetaMask. Coinbase also created the x402 payment protocol, allowing services to accept programmable payments from humans and AI agents without accounts or manual payment.
My View as an Analyst
We are witnessing not just a trend, but a fundamental shift. AI agents need money that can move as fast as their algorithms. Traditional fiat rails are unsuitable for this. Blockchain, on the other hand, is ideally suited for the role of the "payment layer" for the machine economy. The question is not whether this will happen, but which networks and protocols will become the de facto standard. In my view, the current race for TPS and the institutional support we see from Google and the Linux Foundation indicate that bets are being placed on Solana and Ethereum as the primary beneficiaries of this megatrend.