Space Review | The Eve of Web 4.0: OpenClaw Sparks AI Agent Wave, Bank of AI Debuts to Establish the Foundation for Intelligent Agent Economy and Finance

Recently, the explosive popularity of OpenClaw has reignited focus on the AI Agent track. If previous AI booms were still at the tool level, this wave’s core transformation is that AI Agents are shifting from mere command executors to independent actors capable of autonomous decision-making. This AI Agent-driven revolution is also accelerating the public’s awareness of Web4.0—a new era where humans and intelligent entities jointly form the network’s主体, collaboratively creating value.

In this wave, AINFT officially launched the AI Agent New Infrastructure, Bank of AI, which deeply integrates key foundational tools such as x402 payment standards, 8004 on-chain identity protocols, MCP Server, Skills, and OpenClaw’s extension plugins. This creates an AI Agent financial operating system, providing core financial capabilities like on-chain payments, identity verification, and DeFi operations for AI Agents, making it a vital infrastructure for Web4.0.

From OpenClaw’s popularity to the launch of Bank of AI, AI Agents are moving from tools to entities. This episode of Space Roundtable takes OpenClaw’s rise as a starting point to explore the underlying user needs behind the AI Agent wave, the potential evolution of Web4.0, and the changes in user experience brought by AINFT’s AI Agent New Infrastructure. Below is a精彩回顾 of this episode.

OpenClaw ignites the AI Agent track: Is it a short-term hotspot or a structural signal of Web4.0?

Recently, OpenClaw’s emergence has sparked renewed industry attention on AI Agents, quickly becoming the “favorite” among tech circles, capital, and major companies. When a tool can gather such high popularity in a short time, what exactly attracts users? Is it the breakthrough of the technology itself, or does it hit some deeper needs? The guests discussed this from different perspectives.

Web3 enthusiasts see OpenClaw’s rapid rise as not just a fleeting trend but a precise response to users’ deep pain points in efficiency and fault tolerance. They pointed out that in traditional repetitive tasks, humans often spend significant effort on trivial operations. Once AI Agents take over these tasks, energy expenditure drops, and efficiency skyrockets. More importantly, humans are prone to emotional fluctuations and fatigue, leading to errors in high-intensity tasks, whereas AI Agents can perform standardized, predictable executions, providing peace of mind. They directly stated that AI Agents’ cost-effectiveness in efficiency, error rate, and cost far surpasses humans, especially in repetitive roles, where their substitutability is visibly evident.

Building on this, Wang Feng Anc added an important perspective from the limitations of human cognition. He believes that the human brain’s information processing capacity is limited, while AI Agents can operate 24/7. In this context, AI Agents can shoulder human cognitive burdens, helping to handle vast amounts of information and achieve “cognitive outsourcing.” Especially in on-chain transaction processing, risk control becomes a critical pain point. A single mistake in on-chain operations can be costly, making humans the most unstable variable. AI Agents, on the other hand, can bear the high-cost risks of errors, addressing the real-world problem that traders often can’t keep up with market rhythms.

It is precisely this ability of OpenClaw to solve practical problems in efficiency, cognition, and risk that ignited market enthusiasm for AI Agents, leading to a proliferation of various intelligent entities. This concentrated burst prompts speculation: Are we witnessing the evolution from Web3.0 to Web4.0?

In the vision of Web4.0, blockchain and token systems will serve as foundational support. AI Agents will no longer be mere tools but “intelligent proxies” representing user actions—they will hold wallets, possess identities, execute transactions on-chain, participate in governance, manage assets, and even create value. Early signals of this structural change are increasingly being recognized. Wang Feng Anc states that Web3.0’s essence was user sovereignty, immutability, and decentralization, with interactions mainly through user clicks. In Web4.0, the emergence of AI Agents suggests future protocols may prioritize serving AI over humans.

Crypto.0824 illustrated this with everyday examples. He compared traditional operations with AI-driven ones: previously, using SUN.io for token swaps involved opening a webpage, connecting a wallet, setting slippage, signing transactions—five or six steps that were time-consuming and cumbersome. In Web4.0, simply giving an instruction to an AI Agent allows it to automatically find the optimal path and execute. This shift signifies a structural change in interaction logic—users no longer directly operate protocols but instead rely on AI Agents as intermediaries to fulfill their intentions. More importantly, he observed that some new DeFi protocols are designed from the start to better enable AI calls rather than just improving user interfaces. They offer dedicated APIs, optimize gas fees, and even set discounts for AI trading.

As AI Agents become active participants on the internet, holding identities and assets, capable of reading and writing on the network and executing transactions independently, the guests generally agree that what we are witnessing is the structural beginning of Web3.0’s evolution into Web4.0. In this era, humans and intelligent entities will jointly constitute the network’s主体.

From tools to entities, Bank of AI builds the financial infrastructure for Web4.0 AI Agents

The realization of Web4.0’s vision requires a foundational infrastructure that can truly bring AI Agents “to life.” Just as human society relies on bank accounts, identity verification, and payment networks, AI Agents need their own financial base to survive independently on the chain. Against this backdrop, TRON’s native Web3 AI platform AINFT officially launched the AI Agent New Infrastructure—Bank of AI—creating a complete financial operation system for AI Agents, endowing each with full financial capabilities. Specifically, this infrastructure includes five core components:

• x402 Payment Protocol, providing lightweight, low-cost on-chain payment capabilities, supporting automated settlement in high-frequency micro-payment scenarios.

• 8004 Identity Authentication Protocol, issuing verifiable on-chain digital identities for each AI Agent, building trust and reputation systems.

• MCP Server, serving as a standardized interface between AI large models and blockchain services, connecting AI with the on-chain world.

• Skills, offering modular, reusable capabilities such as DeFi operations and asset management.

• OpenClaw extension plugins, enabling any AI Agent based on OpenClaw to immediately gain full on-chain financial capabilities upon integration, achieving plug-and-play.

These five components work together, allowing AI Agents to possess “bank accounts + ID cards + investment accounts,” truly becoming independent participants in on-chain economic activities. The establishment of this system is a foundational step for the transition of intelligent agents’ economy from concept to reality.

However, when AI Agents can not only execute commands but also directly receive and send payments and independently manage on-chain funds, does this mean liberation of time or a gradual loss of initiative for users? Wang Feng Anc’s answer hits the core: the issue isn’t whether to delegate authority but how much and whether it’s controllable.

He states that if AI is a black box that only produces results, reliance anxiety is inevitable. But if AI is a configurable, limitable, and terminable tool, it can enhance efficiency without replacing rights. He predicts that in the future, core human skills will shift from manual operation to configuring AI—defining strategic boundaries, setting risk parameters, and orchestrating multiple AI Agents’ collaboration—requiring users to upgrade their thinking.

Bank of AI provides exactly these boundary-setting capabilities, allowing users to enjoy automation while maintaining control. As a chain-based financial system designed specifically for autonomous AI Agents, it makes AI’s financial actions transparent—every payment, every protocol interaction is traceable. Users can review AI Agent’s operational paths, trace decision bases, and enforce control through preset permissions. This configurable, traceable, and intervene-able mechanism frees users from the anxiety of “being replaced by AI,” transforming them into “architects” who hold the reins.

From OpenClaw’s popularity to the launch of Bank of AI, the concentrated emergence of AI Agents signals a clear message: the future of Web4.0 is here. In this new landscape, humans and intelligent entities form the network’s主体, each playing their role and evolving together. AINFT is building the financial infrastructure for AI Agents in this new world, enabling them to truly “live” on-chain and ensuring humans always retain control. The curtain of Web4.0 has risen— we are both witnesses and builders.