Robinhood\'s major platform transformation: handing over crypto transactions to AI agents

Robinhood announced plans to empower AI agents to execute cryptocurrency trades on behalf of eligible U.S. clients, expanding automated investing beyond stocks and options.

Abstract

Robinhood intends to allow eligible U.S. users to authorize AI agents to conduct cryptocurrency transactions. Robinhood Chain has exceeded $115 million in total locks and Uniswap has reached $500 million in daily trading volume. Blockchain AI payments are expanding, but on-chain transaction volumes are still relatively small.

Robinhood extends AI automation to cryptocurrencies

Robinhood said in a presentation on Friday that the upcoming feature will allow eligible U.S. cryptocurrency users to connect to third-party AI agents that can manage transactions within user-set limits. The company has not announced a launch date for the cryptocurrency version, but said British customers will gain access after it goes online in the United States.

An executive at Robinhood said that users can build trading strategies through preset guardrails without constantly monitoring their accounts. According to the company, the feature is designed to allow customers to automate decisions while maintaining control of the rules that AI agents must follow.

Robinhood extends AI automation beyond stocks

The launch of the cryptocurrency feature follows Robinhood\'s launch of AI-driven proxy accounts for stock and options traders in a beta version at the end of May. In the same presentation, Robinhood said that more than 70,000 proxy accounts have been created through the program, demonstrating early demand for automated investment tools. Robinhood also said the service is compatible with AI models from third-party providers, including Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceX\'s Grok. In addition to investment, the company has also extended the same technology to consumer finance, allowing eligible customers to authorize AI agents to complete credit card purchases on their behalf.

During a presentation, a Robinhood executive said automated agents could help retail investors seize information they might have ignored, providing them with features that used to be used only by institutional investors.

In addition to Robinhood, several cryptocurrency executives have made similar predictions, believing that AI-driven financial activities will increase. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong and Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire both said they expect AI agents to become major users of blockchain payment systems in the next few years.

Robinhood Chain gets attention while AI launches

While announcing automation capabilities, Robinhood continues to expand its blockchain infrastructure. The company has recently focused its cryptocurrency development on tokenized real-world assets and Robinhood Chain, a second-layer Ethereum network built based on Arbitrum. Johann Kerbrat, senior vice president and general manager of Robinhood cryptocurrency, said the network processed 17 million transactions from nearly 350,000 wallet addresses in the first week after launching on July 1.

Data shows that Robinhood Chain\'s total locked positions increased by 23% in 24 hours, exceeding US$115 million, and the cumulative number of addresses is close to 200,000. The same data shows that the network is second only to the Ethereum main network in terms of 24-hour transaction volume of Uniswap, with transaction volume reaching approximately US$500 million on July 8, while the cumulative transaction volume in the first week exceeded US$250 million. Other data shows that Robinhood Chain attracted more than US$70 million in bridging ether in its first week of launch. The analytics platform said continued growth could make the network an \"important new source of demand for Ethereum.\"

AI-driven blockchain payments begin to emerge

In addition to Robinhood, AI-driven blockchain payments are also beginning to emerge. In May, Amazon Cloud Services integrated Coinbase\'s x402 payment protocol into Amazon Bedrock AgentCore, allowing AI agents to use USDC for transaction settlement. In April, cryptocurrency wallet startup Oobit launched a VISA-backed virtual card that enables AI agents to use USDT for commercial purchases.

Even so, AI agents \'blockchain payment activities are still limited. Data showed that the x402 protocol, which supports AI agents, handled approximately $2 million in transaction volume in June, indicating that despite the increasing number of product launches, applications are still in their early stages.