When Bots Have Bank Accounts: The Rise of the Agent Economy (With Sean Neville, Catena Labs)

The rise of an agent-native internet necessitates a specialized financial infrastructure, or "AI bank," to facilitate autonomous economic participation. As AI agents evolve into primary actors capable of executing payments, lending, and credit applications, existing financial risk frameworks—which currently exclude bots—must be replaced by systems that verify agent identity and enforce policy-based constraints. Establishing these foundational standards for secure agent-to-agent communication and financial interaction is critical to unlocking new levels of global prosperity. Sean Neville, co-founder of Circle and architect of USDC, emphasizes that building this infrastructure requires balancing engineering, product development, and regulatory compliance. Moving beyond current limitations, the future of the agentic economy depends on creating a common, trustworthy protocol that allows autonomous actors to interact safely and reliably within the global financial system.