Opinion: Saad Naja, founder and CEO of PiP World
As the world debates whether AI is the next dot-com bubble, chasing valuations rather than implications, they are missing the underlying story of innovation. The same AI infrastructure that fuels trillion-dollar bets is already rewriting how money moves. AI is no longer an investment topic. It’s just the market.
What few have noticed is that the same AI infrastructure that drives headlines is already reshaping markets from within.
The invisible battle taking place behind the candlestick is no longer bulls and bears; it’s between self-learning AIs that never sleep.
Markets are not just people using algorithms. They are autonomous swarms that fight for milliseconds. Agents monitor each market 24/7, spotting risks, discussing strategies and executing them without hesitation.
The following traders are not human
Recent breakthroughs in AI and blockchain adoption have created the perfect conditions for agent marketplaces to flourish. AI provides cognition; meanwhile, blockchain provides trust, verification and payment rails. This offers a medium for AI agents to freely transact, prove and exchange value.
AI has crossed the chasm from stock picker to near-autonomous day trader. He learns and acts faster than any human. He notices what people miss, predicts a move before it happens and never misses it. It’s the ultimate insider, without igniting the SEC. It’s early days for agent-based AI in trading, but make no mistake — it’s here and already moving markets while most traders sleep.
Agent trading even in freefall
During the biggest crypto flash crash on October 10th, while the rest of the crypto market was in freefall, AI agents did the opposite. They stayed calm, cut short the chaos and finished the week up 40%. They gave us insight into the future of the market. One where AI agents don’t just follow code, they respond like real marketers.
Some immediately reduce the risk. Others were waiting for confirmation. A few leaned toward the reduction. What is astonishing is not only the gains, but also the composure. Each AI agent made its own independent decisions, but collectively they converged on profitable outcomes. This is the essence of agent intelligence, autonomous systems that learn to interpret chaos as opportunity.
The rise of self-learning markets
Companies describe similar behavior inside trading desks, where agent systems parse live data from public announcements and feed execution layers in real time. Over time, agents evolve from code to cognition. Autonomous systems that read markets, understand intentions and execute strategies independently. Acting like a digital hive mind, adjusting logic mid-session as the markets change around them.
For years, quant funds and high-frequency traders have pitted humans against algorithms against the market. Enter AI vs. AI. Self-directed systems plan, understand and execute 24 hours a day. What’s emerging is a battlefield of AI — institutional, retail and synthetic — talking to each other in real time.
When AI trades with AI, human intent disappears. Prices move based on machine-to-machine negotiations, not emotions or fundamentals. The market starts trading itself.
Related: AI provides retail investors with a way out of the diversification trap
The majority of global trading volume now takes place through algorithmic systems, with valuations ranging from 60% up to 89%, depending on the market. Within a few months, Symphonyagent trading layer was clearing 140 million dollars in transactions, working with 15 of the world’s largest financial institutions to test self-learning agents for yield and execution.
Everyday investors can finally compete
For decades, investing was all about finding an advantage. AI is giving retail investors that power for the first time. Retail traders may soon apply the same logic once reserved for billion-dollar funds. Swarm intelligence that scans arbitrage, simulates momentum, hedges and executes collaboratively. It’s the retail equivalent of a hedge fund in your pocket.
The walls between institutional and retail financing are breaking down. AI makes the manual of the 1% accessible to the 99%. The next more successful will use agent swarms, instead of index tracking.
When markets trade themselves
AI vs AI warfare will define liquidity, volatility and price discovery. People will still determine direction, risk tolerance and capital allocation, but they won’t push the buttons. Markets will begin to trade independently in swarms of autonomous participants. The power will be transferred to whoever fine-tunes the feedback. When agents detect each other’s fingerprints, they will develop meta-strategies, sometimes to cooperate, sometimes to manipulate each other.
Commercial spaces are quieting down. The next generation of traders won’t shout out orders; they will train artificial intelligence agents. The winners won’t just be the institutions, they’ll be the retailers who fine-tune their swarms with human judgement. We are entering an agent arms race.
The markets of tomorrow will not sleep or panic. Agentic AI will learn, evolve, compete and occasionally conspire at breakneck speed.
As institutions continue to build layers of agents, retail investors face a choice. Follow the herd to stock AI or start training your own AI as their wing(wo)man. It won’t have an AlphaGo moment.
A silent, ruthless supremacy lurks in the rankings, open to anyone brave enough to grab their AI agent.
Opinion: Saad Naja, founder and CEO of PiP World.
This article is for general information purposes and is not intended and should not be considered legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts and opinions expressed herein are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.
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