Franklin Templeton, head of digital assets, says AI agents are the next key use case for blockchain Odaily Planet Daily News: Sandy Kaul, head of digital assets and innovation at Franklin Templeton, an investment management company, stated that the AI proxy economy will increase the demand for blockchain protocols to carry small machine to machine payments. Traditional bank card networks are not suitable for proxy payments due to cost and settlement time. Sandy Kaul pointed out that blockchain networks such as Aptos, Solana, and BNB Chain are more suitable for the proxy economy, as their transactions can be settled within seconds, faster than the settlement time of Visa's network, which takes 1 to 3 business days. In a joint report, payment company Visa and investment justification platform Artemis stated that traditional bank cards designed for low-frequency human commercial activities are insufficient to support AI agents, which require near zero fees and faster settlements. Since its launch in May 2025, the x402 payment protocol developed by Coinbase has achieved an adjusted transaction volume of $15 million and over 109 million adjusted transactions.