gm Bankless Nation, Welcome to Mindshare by Bankless, our newsletter for all things AI x Crypto! Let's catch you up on the arrival of dTAO, which is set to be a game changer for the Bittensor ecosystem!
Today's Issue ⬇️
📈 Market Pulse: ARC Leads the Way Riding high on the Arc Forge launch.
📸 Weekly Market Snapshot: The AI crypto market rebounded ~20% this week, with Rust-based agent project ARC leading the way among the sector's top tokens thanks to a ~120% market cap surge.
This advance came after the announcement of Arc Forge, a new agent launcher platform integrated with Meteora and Jupiter where every buy and sell runs through ARC, channeling fees back into the project's ecosystem.
The initial debut here encountered controversy due to the first featured DeFAI agent, AskJimmy (ASKJ), facing token sniping and so much activity that the Arc Forge frontend crashed. Yet, with ARC being the biggest weekly gainer among the larger AI tokens, it's safe to say most investors weren't phased by these early hiccups.
Token prices as of 3pm ET
24hr
7d
VIRTUALS $1.44
↗ 12.4%
↗ 21.5%
AI16Z $0.48
↗ 4.0%
↗ 47.1%
ARC $0.36
↗ 12.3%
↗ 121.8%
. . .
AI ROLLUP
Rebound Coming?
The AI crypto scene is showing signs of a comeback, with real innovation rising to the fore again.
In AI Rollup #11, Ejaaz and David unpack how tokens like AI16z and COOKIE are bouncing back with double-digit gains, thanks in part to increased code commits and a flurry of new projects.
They also dive into Virtuals Protocol's bold move onto Solana and how Elon Musk's X seems to be gearing up to host specialized AI agents.
Catch the full conversation—watch the episode here! 👇
Yesterday, the crypto-powered, open-source AI network Bittensor launched its long-awaited dTAO upgrade, its most pivotal economic overhaul to date. Let's catch you up on why this matters and what to expect going forward…
dTAO, or dynamic TAO, marks a major change in Bittensor’s tokenomics by giving each of the network's specialized subnets its own token, paired with TAO in a dedicated liquidity pool.
Instead of subnets competing for a shared TAO reward and relying on a single group of validators to rank them, each subnet’s value now rises or falls based on genuine demand via the users, stakers, and validators who adopt it.
This approach tackles the scalability challenge of ranking an ever-growing list of subnets, but it also enforces true market-based valuations, letting the most useful subnets thrive while less valuable ones fade.
Essentially, the entire network “game” is now different:
Miners, who provide the AI services or computational work that make each subnet useful, now earn the subnet’s own token instead of TAO, forcing them to decide between quick selling and long-term investment.
Stakers, who secure the network by locking up tokens, can no longer just stake TAO for guaranteed rewards—they now have to pick specific subnet tokens to buy, and they also risk missing out if they back the wrong ones.
Validators, who measure and manage the performance of subnets, must hold a given subnet’s token to validate it, turning their choice of which subnets to serve into a high-stakes bet.
Finally, owners, who create each subnet, receive their rewards in that subnet’s token and must build genuine value or hype or else risk devaluing their project’s currency.
Over the coming weeks, expect some wild volatility in everything Bittensor as the network adjusts to its new economic model, packed with some big but planned downward pressure around subnets given the Root Proportion sell-pressure mechanism that will be pronounced during these early days.
In the meantime, if you're interested in diving deeper into the Bittensor ecosystem, it’s best to study up on the subnets out there. Also, take a look at some of the initial venues for interacting with dTAO!
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Not financial or tax advice. Bankless content is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. This newsletter is not tax advice. Talk to your accountant. Do your own research.
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