a16z depicts new trends in AI and crypto for 2026

1️⃣ The core competitiveness of AI is no longer the model capability, but who can convert unstructured data into actionable intelligent assets.
2️⃣ Data governance is evolving from a "storage problem" to a systematic engineering of "continuous generation of verifiable intelligence."
3️⃣ The security industry will be the first to be automated by AI, freeing humans to handle truly advanced risk judgments.
4️⃣ Next-generation infrastructure will be natively designed for Agents, rather than serving human concurrency.
5️⃣ Multimodal generation enters a continuous creation phase, where content is no longer a one-time output.
6️⃣ Data analysis tools will evolve into intelligent systems capable of asking questions, reasoning, and providing conclusions.
7️⃣ Video is upgrading from just content format to an interactive and computable space.
8️⃣ Industrial systems will be rewritten natively by AI, rather than patched on old architectures.
9️⃣ The essence of the US manufacturing return is a new industrial paradigm driven by software, automation, and AI.
🔟 The physical world is gaining observability, and cities, power grids, and factories will be managed like code.

11. Energy, electrification, robotics, and AI are merging into a new industrial technology stack.

12. Competition at the application layer is shifting from "efficiency tools" to "directly restructuring business models."

13. Large model platforms are becoming the new application distribution layer and operational interface.

14. Voice + Agents will become the most natural and low-friction interaction method.

15. The rise of promptless applications, where systems proactively execute human intentions.

16. Finance, banking, and insurance will be replaced holistically by AI-native architectures.

17. Collaboration among multiple Agents will give rise to a new enterprise-level coordination layer.

18. The deepest moat in the crypto world is not performance, but the immutability of privacy, identity, and settlement.

19. When stablecoins, prediction markets, and Agent identities mature, AI × Crypto will form an automated ecosystem of collaboration, trading, and settlement.