Chain Reaction - 13th January 2025
2025 - The year of the AI agent and blockchain supporting it
Welcome back folks, we hope you had a great break over the holiday period. We have a lot to look forward to in 2025 but before we begin, a few announcements and recaps.
First up, just before the end of the year we put out our 2024 year in review for crypto but it wasn’t just crypto globally like you normally see, but more of a recap of events around Australia. Check this out as we’ve made it a little interactive.
You can also check out the list of all the meetups we recorded during the year around Australia.
This is all part of our new website which you can learn more about here www.defi.org.au
Check out the video recap of all the new features that are there
This year we will be kicking things off with some exciting new initiatives in the works such as new partnerships showcasing how blockchain helps the AI space (it’s not just crypto turning AI agents into memes). First up, we want to acknowledge that we’re part of a new foundation with some big global players at ASIMOV Protocol.
Their mission is to help bring security to data that’s used in the AI space. We’ve spoken about it for a while here but it;s great to see that more are seeing the benefits of blockchain tech to help AI.
So, if you’re interested in building the truth, check them out here https://asimovprotocol.org/
and follow on socials too
Data is one side of things when it comes to a more secure AI future. The other side of it is ensuring the transactions that are happening on there are also secure. If AI agents or workflows aren’t following the rules that are set by regulations or their ecosystem they’re going to be useless. Even if we did have those rules, there will also be a need to verify this and that’s where ReCircuit comes in. Using tools and techniques learnt in the blockchain space (think ZK proofs and selective disclosure), it will also provide a layer of trust and security to the agentic AI age.
Learn more about it here: https://docs.recircuit.xyz/
and follow them on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/recircuitxyz
Finally, as part of all this, ReCircuit is building a community to help those who want to learn about AI, AI agents and agentic workflows. You can see videos, news and even track insights from the AI agent token prices out there. That will be out later this week but here's a preview.
Also folks, keep an eye out on our Luma page as we'll announce our first onlione meetup for the year over here https://lu.ma/ausdefi
Many in the tech space talk about 2025 being the year of the AI agent, well blockchain is necessary if you want to keep this trustworthy and safe.
Remembrance
Before we go further we need to also acknowledge something a little bit more somber and that’s the loss of a friend of the community, Ashley Cooper (middle).
He was a familiar face to many and a friend and colleague to others we know well. He was a co-founder of the asset management firm JellyC and had a storied investing career. Please do reach out to Michael and Drew over at JellyC if you can and take a moment to remember Ash.
Here’s his last interview per his LinkedIn where he spoke with Jamie Coutts of Real Vision.
News
Congrats to our friends at Redbelly Network on their win being voted as RWA chain of the year on Polymarkets. If you have not heard about them, they’re the Aussie founded blockchain out of Data61 (CSIRO), University of Sydney and others.
Crypto predictions here from the folks at Piper Alderman. If you're not following their Bits of Blocks blog then you should https://www.linkedin.com/posts/stevenpettigrove_tldr-2025-crypto-predications-round-up-activity-7283241757134221313-ItLy?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_android
Ai16z has their big ideas for crypto here https://www.linkedin.com/posts/brandonturp_a16z-crypto-just-released-5-big-ideas-for-activity-7283202811033468928-w1Jv?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
Good news out of the UK with proof of stake mechanisms underlying certain blockchains (e.g.Ethereum, Solana) will not be considered collective investment schemes under UK law. More here https://www.linkedin.com/posts/wchughes2024_ethereum-solana-uk-activity-7283158193797513216-qakn?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
There was some confirmation of the suspicion in the industry that Chokepoint 2.0 was a targeted mission and that crypto was being unfairly targeted. Those suspicions received support this week. https://news.bitcoin.com/whistleblowers-expose-fdic-operation-chokepoint-2-0-coverup-and-disinformation-campaign/
We mentioned AI agents earlier and we were lucky enough to have co-founder, Arturo Rodriguez quoted in this article by Coin Telegraphs’ Tom Mitchelhill talking about memes and AI. https://cointelegraph.com/news/ai-agents-memecoins-investments
It’s the anniversary of the first spot Bitcoin ETF coming to market and $44bn of inflows through the year isn’t bad at all. See more here https://cointelegraph.com/news/first-us-spot-bitcoin-etf-anniversary
CFTCs enforcement director leaves before Trump takes office? Probably a smart move
Something to leave you with is this interesting article from CoinDesk on the age of humans and machines coming together on chain. One key quote from there harkens back to what we mentioned at the start.
“What is needed is a global system that supports financial transactions, allows humans and computers to come together to vote and set rules, is immutable and public, and is resilient.”
It’s our belief in this sort of thing that will spark a lot of what Aus DeFi will be doing this year so keep an eye out on that folks.
That’s it for now, see you next week!
About Aus DeFi Association
The Australian DeFi Association (Aus DeFi) is a non-profit community organisation dedicated to increasing education and awareness of blockchain technology, specifically decentralised finance (DeFi) and web3-based projects. Their goal is to empower the Australian community with the knowledge and tools to participate in the decentralised economy, and to promote the adoption and growth of blockchain technology in Australia. They strive to provide a more grassroots approach to promoting blockchain technology compared to other industry-focused organisations in Australia, and to provide a platform for community members to learn about and engage with this emerging technology.
Sponsors
This newsletter is brought to you by our sponsors at NotCentralised who use their AI tool, SIKE, to bring together the highlights each week. For more on SIKE and the world of business-friendly AI, see