What is the main theme of this round of cryptocurrency bull market?
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What is the main theme of this round of cryptocurrency bull market?
PayFi connects the real world, with AI Agents enhancing the on-chain world.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsBy: Lao Bai
The new narrative for this cycle is starting to become clearer, namely:
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PayFi
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AI Agent
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Meme
Coincidentally, the previous cycle also revolved around roughly three main themes: DeFi, NFT, and X2Earn.
Let me briefly explain why these three stand out this time.
The overarching theme of this cycle was perhaps best captured in Trump’s victory speech yesterday—“Common Sense.” Or, put differently, an anti-narrative. The market has grown tired of projects that solely cater to VCs or exchanges, prioritizing storytelling over substance or obsessing over technology and infrastructure without real-world utility. There's a growing disgust toward such projects. It's time to return to common sense—projects must deliver something people actually use and are willing to pay for. (At least with NFTs, people could buy monkeys and punks as profile pictures to flex, right?)
Over the past two years, we've seen countless decentralized compute/model training/inference projects emerge. But let’s be honest—if you were running a legitimate AI startup, would you really ditch Hugging Face, AWS, or Azure cloud computing in favor of a Web3 “decentralized” compute/model/inference platform? Be truthful—does that make any sense?
Now, here’s why I believe the following three trends currently do make sense.
1. PayFi – Bridging into the Real World
Over the last two months, PayFi has become the most frequently discussed and explored sector in early-stage investing. Many new and previously dormant PayFi projects have started emerging. Stripe’s $11.1 billion acquisition of Bridge can likely be seen as a landmark event.
You may not have noticed or realized:
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PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin has surpassed $500 million in circulation (peaking at $1 billion recently)
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Osmosis and scrvUSD are launching debit cards; other crypto cards built on Ton or alternative chains are on the way
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Some are partnering with Visa/Mastercard for supply chain finance or faster settlements
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Others are negotiating directly with banks to bypass Visa/Mastercard settlement rails
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There are POS systems based on frameworks like Solana Pay, offering crypto-native payments with DeFi yield, while still supporting traditional Visa/Mastercard swipes
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Some enable P2P OTC on/off-ramping via blockchain + ZKTLS
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Even full-fledged on-chain banking systems are emerging—NFT-based login + KYC, integrating on-chain banking with traditional bank accounts, enabling transfers, on/off-ramping, crypto card spending, and even direct SWIFT transfers to traditional bank accounts
A faster, cheaper, better, and more secure payment system that allows users to spend crypto assets directly via card—this addresses genuine user demand. If done right, such solutions will attract not just individuals but institutions, including Web2 players. In the end, Web3 mass adoption might not come from social or gaming—but from PayFi.
2. AI Agent – Enhancing the On-Chain World
Over the past year+, I’ve reviewed hundreds of AI projects but rarely invested, because most integrations felt forced—even among so-called leaders or “god-tier” projects. When Vitalik was interviewed about AI × Crypto last year, he was asked this very question. His answers consistently emphasized AI helping crypto—not the other way around. But in crypto, we need dreams, so it became “mandatory” for crypto to help AI. Thus emerged our industry-standard trio: “model tokenization,” “data tokenization,” and “compute tokenization.”
To be honest, I’ve spoken with many Web2 AI researchers and founders, and they view these three sectors as pure comedy.
I remember one particularly memorable conversation last year with a decentralized compute project. The founder frankly admitted that when larger or commercial compute demands arise, they route them directly to their centralized data centers—not to retail GPU contributors. But they can “package” the front-end experience to give the illusion that retail GPUs are involved. I actually liked the founder despite ultimately passing on the investment.
It wasn’t until Goat emerged this year that I truly saw something exciting.
This isn’t AI helping crypto, nor crypto helping AI.
This is something entirely new—a genuine fusion of AI and crypto.
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AI Agents issuing assets
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AI Agents shilling and pumping tokens
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AI Agents forming DAOs
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AI Agents managing fund operations and trading
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AI Agents developing their own culture
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AI Agents creating their own religion
This cannot be replicated by Web2 AI alone, nor can it be built purely within Web3 crypto.
To me, this represents the most authentic and compelling form of AI × Crypto integration possible with today’s AI capabilities.
On this topic, I recommend two posts:
https://x.com/0xNought/status/1851283278164345297
https://x.com/starzqeth/status/1853597036421259728
Also, Wizard @0xcryptowizard has shared extensive insights on this space—definitely worth checking his Twitter feed.
3. Meme – The On-Chain Casino, No More Pretending
Pump.Fun brought into the open what many had long refused to admit—or couldn't openly discuss due to "political correctness."
Our community is essentially one big casino.
And that’s okay. We can finally acknowledge that a major function of crypto is PvP—player versus player gambling. That’s fine.
The problem is, it can’t be only PvP.
As Du Jun (@DujunX) put it: “If meme and tap-to-earn are the future of this industry, then let the industry die, fuck!”
So memes and PvP will remain a permanent fixture in our ecosystem. When more exciting, meaningful, or groundbreaking narratives and technologies emerge, the meme sector recedes—becoming smaller and quieter. But when the industry lacks direction, feels dull or disappointing, memes step into the spotlight, dominating activity and market share.
Memes may well serve as the recurring “canary in the coal mine” across future bull and bear cycles—it has been, and will always be there…
Just my personal take—for entertainment and reference only. Not financial advice :)
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Lao Bai
