Blockchain-powered AI agent 'ai16z' reaches $1.5 billion market cap

AI agent project ai16z, which bears no relation to the similarly-named Silicon Valley VC fund, rocketed to reach a market cap of $1.5 billion on Saturday before retreating to a value of around $1.3 billion later on Sunday. 

The project, which presents itself as an AI agent-staffed VC fund powered by 'memefund' launcher Daos.fun, has become the first Solana token extension to reach the $1 billion milestone. Solana's token extensions provide new functionality for its token standard, and are also known as Token 2022. 

The project's value has increased by more than tenfold in the past two months since it was first shouted out by (the real) Marc Andreessen, driven by the increasing interest in AI agent-related blockchain projects from both retail and institutional investors. Notably, ai16z also presides over the Eliza development framework that allows developers to launch their own AI agents. 

The milestone was reached despite volatility in the fund's value caused by inner turmoil and swiftly-changing AI narratives . Eliza Labs, the team behind the fund, also recently announced it will partner with Stanford University to study how autonomous blockchain-based AI bots will integrate with the wider digital asset economy. 

Notably, ai16z has not achieved any major exchange listings, unlike other $1 billion-and-up memecoins such as Floki, Dogwifhat, Dogecoin, and a handful of others. Several whales have made large purchases of the token recently, according to blockchain analysis firm Lookonchain.