Stablecoins and AI Integration: How is the future global economic system, as envisioned by Circle's CEO, being constructed?

In February 2026, Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire issued a verified assertion: “We are at a turning point. The internet is evolving from transmitting information to transmitting value.” He further pointed out that blockchain, stablecoins, and artificial intelligence are not isolated technological trends but are merging into a “new global economic system built natively on the internet.”

This view is not only an optimistic outlook on the future of technology but also a precise capture of the profound changes currently happening in global financial infrastructure. While information flows have long achieved seamless integration, value flows (payments, asset transactions, financial contracts) remain trapped in fragmented channels composed of intermediaries, borders, and outdated clearing systems. Today, with explosive growth in the stablecoin market and the emergence of AI agent economies, the infrastructure enabling free movement of value like information is accelerating its development.

Core Narrative Background and Timeline

Jeremy Allaire’s latest statements are not isolated but part of a series of discussions on upgrading financial infrastructure. By reviewing recent timelines, we can better understand the evolution of this prophecy:

• December 2025: Allaire discusses Circle’s ten-year vision in a podcast, aiming for stablecoin technology to become an “important infrastructure” of the internet and financial systems, facilitating frictionless value exchange to promote global economic prosperity.
• January 2026 (Davos World Economic Forum): Allaire explicitly states that “billions of AI agents” will need a payment system in the future, and stablecoins are the only viable solution today. He also refutes concerns that stablecoin yields might trigger bank runs, citing the approximately $11 trillion in money market funds as a historical analogy to demonstrate their reasonableness and enormous potential within the financial system.
• February 2026: Combining Circle’s Q4 and full-year performance, Allaire officially announces the concept of the “Value Internet,” highlighting USDC’s continued expansion, nearly 50% of stablecoin trading volume, and infrastructure projects like Arc and CCTP, proving that this transformation “is happening.”

This timeline clearly demonstrates a complete causal chain from vision setting and logical reasoning to real-world performance support.

Data and Structural Analysis: The Ongoing Structural Shift

Behind Allaire’s prophecy are data and structural forces capable of reshaping the global financial landscape. This is not just technological evolution but a fundamental reconfiguration of underlying economic logic.

• Explosion of stablecoin scale: Artemis data shows that in 2025, global stablecoin transaction volume surged to about $33 trillion, a 72% year-over-year increase. This growth far exceeds traditional cross-border payment systems, clearly reflecting market demand for efficient, programmable, low-cost value transfer methods.
• Fusion of AI and crypto: Wintermute Ventures’ 2026 outlook notes that crypto technology is becoming the “clearing and settlement layer” of the internet economy. This infrastructure role directly meets the intrinsic needs of the AI agent economy. AI agents require the ability to autonomously perform micro-payments, purchase computing power, or data services, and the programmability and real-time settlement features of stablecoins make them the only feasible “language” for machine-to-machine economic activity.
• Modular infrastructure: Traditional financial services are being disassembled into programmable modules. For example, Circle’s CCTP (Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol) and Circle Payments Network are building an open on-chain financial infrastructure layer. This allows developers to invoke global payment and clearing capabilities as easily as calling APIs, greatly lowering the barriers to value transfer.

Market Perspectives and Public Opinion Divergence

Despite clear trends, there are significant disagreements in the market regarding the path and impact of building this value internet. The discourse mainly focuses on the following core controversies:

Reality Check: The Gap Between Vision and Practice

While acknowledging enormous potential, we must also cautiously examine the real basis and challenges behind Circle’s CEO’s narrative.

• Facts: Growth in USDC market share, soaring stablecoin transaction volumes, and deployment of infrastructure like CCTP are verifiable facts.
• Perspective: “The internet is evolving from transmitting information to transmitting value” is a grand judgment based on current data, but its final form remains uncertain.
• Speculation: The idea that “billions of AI agents will interact and perform economic functions on the internet” is a powerful future hypothesis. Logically sound, but the timing, business models, and actual demand for stablecoins still need market validation. The key challenge now is the “last mile”: how to seamlessly integrate on-chain assets into real-world consumption scenarios.

Profound Impact on the Crypto Industry

This establishment of the “value transfer” paradigm is reshaping the crypto industry on three levels:

1. From trading tools to infrastructure: Crypto assets are no longer just speculative instruments. Stablecoins like USDC are becoming core infrastructure for global payments, cross-border settlements, and corporate treasury management.
2. Birth of a “machine economy”: The combination of IoT and stablecoins is exploring new models like “Device as a Service” (DaaS). From high-end industrial equipment billed by the second to P2P green energy trading in distributed solar, physical assets are being endowed with programmable economic attributes, opening a new track for autonomous machine economies.
3. Promoting seamless integration of DeFi and TradFi: Future financial products will no longer be distinctly DeFi or TradFi. User experience will resemble current fintech apps, but backend transactions, routing, and settlement will rely on efficient on-chain protocols. Distribution channels and user experience will become more important than the underlying technology itself.

Multi-Scenario Evolution Projections

Based on current technological, regulatory, and market interactions, we can project three possible scenarios over the next 3 to 5 years:

• Scenario 1: Accelerated Integration (Higher Probability)
  • Conditions: Major economies (EU, US, Hong Kong) implement clear and friendly regulations; traditional financial institutions massively adopt stablecoin infrastructure; AI agent economy experiences its first explosive growth.
  • Features: Stablecoin payments become standard for cross-border e-commerce, remittances, and digital content; crypto cards enable seamless offline on-chain asset spending; traditional companies incorporate stablecoins into treasury management.
• Scenario 2: Regulatory Fragmentation (Medium Probability)
  • Conditions: Major economies fail to reach consensus on stablecoin regulation, creating “regulatory islands”; countries enforce stablecoin peg to their national fiat and local operation.
  • Features: Global stablecoins like USDC face restrictions in some regions, replaced by compliant “domestic stablecoins”; cross-border flows encounter exchange friction, but on-chain settlement remains more efficient than traditional systems.
• Scenario 3: Black Swan Event (Lower Probability, but High Impact)
  • Conditions: Major stablecoin issuers suffer from mismanaged reserves (e.g., holding high-risk assets) or severe hacking incidents, leading to de-pegging or collapse, triggering systemic trust crises.
  • Features: Regulators impose strict restrictions, causing industry setbacks of 3-5 years; the industry re-evaluates “optimal asset backing” and “on-chain transparency,” with high barriers to entry. Ultimately, CBDC-based solutions or highly regulated stablecoins may prevail.

Conclusion

Jeremy Allaire’s prophecy is not just a company’s aspiration but a precise outline of the core trajectory of global digital economic transformation. When value transfer becomes as instant, open, and inexpensive as information transfer, business models, industry organization, and even global division of labor will be rewritten. From $33 trillion in transaction volume, to AI-driven payment demands, to autonomous IoT device economies—all point toward a profound infrastructural overhaul. For industry participants, understanding this “from information to value” leap is the starting point to seize opportunities in the next internet cycle.