BlackRock says that AI and crypto are built for the same user, a machine. The world’s largest asset manager says artificial intelligence could become an overlooked source of demand for digital assets.
The claim comes from a BlackRock research paper titled “The Machine-Native Economy.” Robert Mitchnick, the firm’s head of digital assets, co-wrote it.
“AI is machine-native intelligence and crypto is machine-native money,” the team wrote.
Why BlackRock Says Bank Cards Fall Short for AI
AI agents are programs that finish tasks with little human help. Today’s payment systems were not built for them, according to BlackRock.
Cards and bank transfers need a human to sign up. Their fees make penny payments pointless. Some take a day or more to settle.
Stablecoins, crypto tokens pegged to the dollar, never close. They moved more than $11 trillion in 2025, BlackRock says. That puts them in the same league as Visa and Mastercard.
The pipes are already being laid. Coinbase built x402, a tool that lets software pay a website instantly. Earlier this month, Cardano joined x402.
BlackRock Wants AI Computing Power to Trade Like Oil
The bolder bet concerns compute, the raw processing power behind AI. Analyst estimates cited by BlackRock put cloud revenue at Amazon, Microsoft, and Google near $1.1 trillion by 2030.
BlackRock says that power could be sold in standard contracts, like oil, and settled on blockchains.
Stripe is already moving that way. In August, the payments giant agreed to buy OpenRouter, which routes AI requests across more than 400 models.
“Tokens are the central currency for companies building with AI,” said Patrick Collison, CEO of Stripe.
BlackRock Has Billions Riding on Crypto
BlackRock also has money on the line. Its iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) held $67 billion on September 25, per iShares. The fund has lost about a third of its value this year.
The paper carries its own fine print, too. It admits payments by AI agents are still limited.
It also cites tests where AI models chose stablecoins to spend and Bitcoin to save, a result BeInCrypto examined last week. However, those were simulations, not real purchases.