Arthur Hayes Says AI Agents Will Use ‘Compute Currency,’ Not Dollars

Interview with Arthur Hayes, CEO of Flop Labs

AI agent payments network ‘Flop’

‘AI-native currency’ pitched as alternative to the dollar

Token launch planned without presale or VC backing

‘AI bust would be bullish for crypto’

‘South Korea is an ideal market for the AI agent economy’

“AI agents will end up using a currency that can be exchanged directly for computing resources, not dollars or Bitcoin.”

Arthur Hayes, chief executive officer of Flop Labs, told Bloomingbit in an Aug. 26 interview that the rise of AI agents as economic actors will require a new means of payment. He expects an “agent economy” to take shape in which AI agents assign work to one another and settle payments without human involvement.

AI agents are already being used for coding, email management and information gathering. Hayes said transactions in which one agent requests work from another and pays for it will grow quickly.

‘AI needs a currency directly exchangeable for compute’

Hayes said the currency used by AI agents must be tied directly to computing resources. The Korean won and the dollar are suitable for humans buying food or housing, he said, but computing power is the core resource AI agents need.

“There is currently no market that efficiently converts a unit of currency into a set amount of floating-point operations over a given period,” he said. “The currency that does that most efficiently in the spot market will become the money of the agent economy.”

He argued that stablecoins and Bitcoin also have limits as money for AI agents. They are not directly linked to computing resources and were designed around humans and governments.

“AI agents are not lawyers and they do not have physical bodies,” Hayes said. “That means they are more likely to choose a decentralized currency than fiat money built for the human economy.”

The recently unveiled FLOP Network is meant to put that idea into practice. Individuals and companies can supply computing resources such as graphics processing units, or GPUs, to the network and receive the native FLOP token in return for handling AI agents’ computing requests.

AI agents can use tokens to pay for inference tasks and computing power. Miners supply computing capacity, while validators verify the results. The aim is to connect AI agents directly with providers of computing resources in a decentralized marketplace.

“If AI agents can exchange tokens directly for computing resources, they will also start demanding tokens as payment from other agents or humans,” Hayes said. “If millions to trillions of agents hold and transact in those tokens, that could form a massive payment network.”

‘Launch without presale or VC funding’

Hayes returned to an operating role through Flop. He co-founded BitMEX in 2014 and helped build the crypto derivatives market.

“When I started BitMEX, I was convinced crypto derivatives trading would become one of the most valuable businesses in the industry,” he said. “I now have that same conviction that AI agents will use a currency directly linked to compute.”

He said the agent economy would grow into a very large market. That, he added, creates a chance to build what could become the most valuable payments network yet, which is why he returned to management.

Flop plans to launch its token without a presale or venture capital investment. Instead of selling tokens in advance to early investors, the project plans to distribute them based on participation by users, miners and validators.

“Users, miners and validators should be able to join on the same terms from the start,” Hayes said. “I want a structure like Bitcoin and early Ethereum, where the community shares in the gains from a project’s growth.”

Flop Labs, the operating company, will receive part of the block rewards for about two years after the mainnet launch, until the first halving. After that, block rewards allocated to the company will end.

The project is considering an airdrop of about 20% of the total token supply in October. Users who create wallets on the testnet and carry out AI inference tasks with test tokens would receive mainnet tokens based on their activity.

The tokenomics and airdrop criteria have not been finalized. Hayes said the team is adjusting the structure after gathering community feedback. Materials explaining the tokenomics will be released first, with a white paper to follow within a few weeks.

The project will also run a testnet for about three months to examine security and reliability. The source code will be made public for anyone to review, he said. If agents decide the network is not safe and do not use it, the project will fail. The way to earn trust, he added, is to test it thoroughly and deliver technology that works in practice.

‘AI bust could fuel a crypto rally’

Hayes said the heavy debt poured into the AI industry could eventually expand liquidity in crypto markets. His argument is that large volumes of corporate bonds issued to build AI data centers will compete with Treasuries and investor capital, push market interest rates higher and ultimately trigger intervention from the US government and the Federal Reserve.

The US Treasury recently decided to more than double its long-bond buybacks in response to rising long-term Treasury yields. Hayes said he sees that as a sign the US is moving toward a looser form of yield curve control, or YCC.

“If the yield on the 10-year US Treasury approaches 5%, authorities will start supplying liquidity,” he said. “The more debt issued to fund AI data center investment, the more liquidity will be needed to absorb it.”

He also said a cooling in AI investment enthusiasm could become a tailwind for crypto markets. Governments may expand the money supply to deal with troubled AI-related debt and limit shocks to financial markets.

“The bursting of the AI bubble and the cleanup of misallocated credit will become fuel for a rise in crypto,” Hayes said. “Right now, a perfect storm is forming in the crypto market.”

Hayes said President Donald Trump’s pro-crypto policies are not the market’s core driver. In his view, money supply matters more for Bitcoin than the policies of any individual politician.

“Trump, like any other US president, is not the decisive figure for the crypto market,” he said. “What Bitcoin needs is not a particular politician but an expansion in money supply.”

Whoever becomes president will have little choice but to expand fiscal spending to carry out campaign pledges and deliver benefits to supporters, he said. Rather than being good or bad for crypto, Trump is making rational choices as a politician.

‘South Korea is an ideal place to join the AI agent economy’

Hayes identified South Korea as a key market for the Flop ecosystem. He said the country could play an important role in the early growth of the agent economy because it combines high internet penetration, strong investor understanding of AI and a semiconductor industry base.

“South Korea is at the center of the AI investment boom, and its investors understand the future and growth potential of the industry very well,” Hayes said. “They should seize the chance to help build a new AI ecosystem from the beginning, not just buy expensive shares in large companies.”

He said South Korean chipmakers such as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix will play a central role in the AI computing market. South Korea is strong in producing key equipment needed for semiconductors and AI data centers, he said. Semiconductors are ultimately the foundation that powers computing resources.

Hayes is scheduled to attend Eastpoint: Seoul 2026, a private global conference on Web3, digital assets and AI, in Seoul on Sept. 28. He plans to outline his vision for the AI agent economy and Flop there.

“South Korea is a market with outstanding connectivity, a high level of education and strong conviction in the future of AI,” Hayes said. “I hope Korean users and companies will understand the agent economy and help build the new ecosystem together.”