BitGo launches innovation unit to design crypto's next breakout application

BitGo BitGo Holdings, Inc. (BTGO) launched a new research and innovation unit on Wednesday to design, launch, and prove out the next breakout application for digital assets.

"We're focused on use cases that only crypto can deliver, like rates and returns no traditional system can touch, and we're using AI to build them in months, not years," BitGo said in a press release.

The unit, named BitGo Labs, will initially focus on the intersection of AI and crypto. BitGo said the AI economy still needs crypto financial infrastructure to process micropayments, enable instant settlement, and secure assets.

BitGo Labs is launching with several projects in that area, including Gokubu, a consumer application that utilizes an AI-powered card designed to optimize user spending. The application, already live, assigns the user to a personalized AI financial assistant that would help them access better rewards and more value from transactions.

"Beyond its first projects, BitGo Labs will publish research, prototype protocols and reference implementations, partner with builders, academics, and institutions across the crypto and AI communities," BitGo said. "Every project will be held to the same test: does this application do something no existing system can, and does it make people's lives measurably better?"

Agents use stablecoins

In an interview with The Block earlier this month, BitGo CEO Mike Belshe said AI agents will very likely use stablecoins as their native currency, stating that humans will likely maintain control over AI for much longer than some predict.

His remark came in response to a question about Maelstrom CIO Arthur Hayes' argument that stablecoins and other digital currencies cannot function as native currencies for AI agents because they can't be converted directly into compute power.

"You could end up with agents that are paying each other in some sort of value that the agents decide is good, but they're still going to interface with a human system," Belshe told The Block.