InfoFi Track Divergence: KAITO Attention Economy vs ARKM Intelligence Monetization Business Model Analysis

By 2026, the pricing logic of the crypto market's AI narratives is undergoing profound divergence. On one side are the thriving computational power layers and agent platforms; on the other are the once highly sought-after information infrastructure tracks, among which two representative projects—Kaito and Arkham—are currently experiencing a sharp disconnect between token prices and product utility.

Both attempt to transform "information" into tradable on-chain assets, but their approaches are fundamentally different: Kaito is building an attention market, tokenizing social buzz and content influence; Arkham is constructing an intelligence market, converting on-chain addresses and real-world behaviors into verifiable data products. One seeks to price "attention," the other to price "truth."

As of May 28, 2026, according to Gate Market data, KAITO is priced at $0.4688, ARKM at $0.14115, both having declined about 78% over the past year. Their price performance is highly similar, masking the essential differences in the durability of their respective business models.

The Different Definitions of Two Types of Information Assets

Kaito's core product is an AI-driven crypto information aggregation and search platform. Its token, KAITO, initially achieved a cold start through the "Yaps" points mechanism—users accumulate Yaps points through content creation and community participation, then exchange them for token rewards. However, this mechanism faced a structural shock in January 2026. Nikita Bier, head of product at X platform (formerly Twitter), announced revisions to API policies, explicitly banning any applications that reward users for posting on X, citing the proliferation of AI-generated spam content. Kaito immediately announced the shutdown of the Yaps product, causing its token price to drop about 17% within hours. Subsequently, Kaito shifted to a "Kaito Studio" model, focusing on direct collaborations with high-quality creators and cross-platform content distribution.

Arkham, on the other hand, took a completely different route. Its Ultra AI engine can associate on-chain addresses with real-world entities, providing institutional-level intelligence analysis through tools like Profiler and Visualizer. Meanwhile, Intel Exchange established a decentralized intelligence marketplace where users can buy or sell on-chain analysis results, address labels, and vulnerability reports using ARKM tokens. This is an attempt to directly monetize "intelligence."

Both projects share the goal of moving information out of the realm of free public goods into the pricing system of the crypto economy. But they anchor their value propositions very differently—this divergence became even clearer after the policy storm on the X platform in early 2026.

From Narrative Resonance to Path Divergence

In early 2024, the narrative of AI and crypto integration entered an explosive phase, with both Kaito and Arkham gaining significant market attention. Kaito rapidly accumulated users and community buzz through its Yaps points mechanism, becoming a core node in the crypto social graph. Arkham, through a series of high-value intelligence disclosures—including on-chain tracking of Lazarus Group and real-time tagging of KelpDAO’s stolen funds—established itself as the "On-Chain FBI" in the industry.

January 2026 marked a critical turning point. X platform’s API ban on InfoFi-type applications directly impacted the attention economy model centered on "posting mining." The shutdown of Yaps was not just a product adjustment but exposed the structural fragility of attention assets: its value creation depended entirely on external platform policies.

Meanwhile, Arkham’s usage and industry citation rates continued to rise. Institutional crypto adoption—such as Strategy’s holding of 843,738 BTC, the on-chain activities of BlackRock IBIT, and the wallets of sovereign funds—created high-frequency, high-value intelligence demand for Arkham. From this moment, the path divergence shifted from implicit to explicit.

The Differing Sustainability of Two Economic Models

To better understand the differences, here is a comparison across four key dimensions.

Core Value Unit

Kaito’s value anchor is social influence and content engagement. After the Yaps shutdown, its value capture relies more on brand partnerships and KOL marketing. Arkham’s value anchor is on-chain address labels and behavioral analysis reports, which are verifiable.

Demand Drivers

Kaito’s demand stems from project marketing needs and KOL monetization. Arkham’s demand comes from institutional compliance, trading risk control, media investigations, and security tracking—these needs are less affected by market cycles.

Supply Side Characteristics

The supply of attention economy—user-generated content—has extremely low marginal costs and high substitutability. The supply of intelligence relies on professional analysis capabilities and AI engines; Arkham’s Ultra AI, developed over more than three years, has a certain technical barrier to entry.

Token Consumption/Flow Logic

KAITO’s circulation mainly depends on incentives and distribution, lacking sustained consumption scenarios. ARKM, as a purchasing power in Intel Exchange, provides a fundamental usage scenario for the token.

From a numerical perspective: as of May 28, 2026, according to Gate Market data, ARKM has increased by 32.95% over the past 90 days, with a 24-hour trading volume of $3.4364 million; KAITO has increased by 38.34% over the same period, with a 24-hour trading volume of $66.4k. The significant difference in trading activity reflects, to some extent, the market’s participation depth in these two assets.

What Is the Market Debating?

Currently, three representative viewpoints have formed around these two paths.

The first believes that although the attention economy was heavily impacted by X platform’s policy crackdown, Kaito Studio’s pivot—focusing on cross-platform content distribution and high-quality creator collaborations—may open a new growth channel. Supporters argue that the crypto market is fundamentally narrative-driven, and tools capable of precisely capturing and quantifying attention still hold unique value.

The second holds that intelligence monetization is a more sustainable business model. Arkham’s services—associating addresses, tracking illicit funds, revealing institutional holdings—are supported by real-world demand. Information related to North Korea’s Lazarus Group’s money laundering routes and DeFi protocol attack fund flows has security and compliance value that won’t vanish with market sentiment.

The third perspective highlights a peculiar phenomenon: ARKM’s price has fallen about 97% from its all-time high of around $4, yet product usage continues to rise. This "divergence between product value and token price" reveals a core contradiction in the current intelligence economy—most of the value created by the product is captured externally (media, analysts, institutions) and has not effectively flowed back to token holders.

Industry Impact Analysis: InfoFi Moving from Concept to Divergence

The divergence of Kaito and Arkham’s paths has three impacts on the entire InfoFi track.

First, it accelerates the confirmation of information assetization. Whether attention or intelligence, both validate a premise: the crypto market is willing to pay for "useful information." This provides market validation for subsequent information infrastructure projects.

Second, it exposes shortcomings in token economic design. Both paths face the same question: how to effectively convert product value into token value? The attention economy lost its main token distribution channel after Yaps shut down, while the value capture of the intelligence economy is overly indirect.

Third, it promotes deeper integration of AI and on-chain analysis. Arkham’s Ultra AI demonstrates AI’s potential in address clustering, entity recognition, and behavior prediction. This direction has attracted more participants, expanding the on-chain intelligence analysis market.

Conclusion

The stories of Kaito and Arkham are essentially an early evolution of crypto information infrastructure. Attention and intelligence, seemingly different in value dimension, actually answer the same question: in an age of information overload, what information is worth pricing, and how to price it.

From a business logic perspective, the intelligence economy—based on "verifiable real needs"—has more stable underlying support than the attention economy, fueled by "social heat," especially after X platform’s policy changes confirmed the platform dependency risks of attention-based models. But this does not mean attention has no value: it shines brightly in bull markets and falls silent in bear markets. The value of intelligence is closer to the nature of infrastructure—steady, dull, but indispensable.

The ultimate test of these two models is not which product is more needed, but who solves the token economy’s value feedback loop first. Whoever can effectively and sustainably transmit the incremental value created by their product to token holders will have a longer-lasting stance in the long run of InfoFi. Until then, the gap between price and technology remains the most real and brutal footnote of this track.