Crypto, AI Agents, And The Next Big Cycle w/ Ran Neuner | Raoul Pal The Journey Man

Ran Neuner argues that crypto has found product-market fit in tokenization, with stocks, bonds, and commodities moving on-chain and using existing block-space capacity. He connects that infrastructure to an agent-driven future, predicting continuous on-chain markets and citing projections of roughly 1 billion transacting agents by 2028–2029 and about 217 billion daily transactions.

Neuner sees the AI buildout—including data centers, chips, and energy infrastructure funded by the Nasdaq’s AI-related rally—as potentially supporting agents that transact through crypto protocols. He expects the agentic economy around 2027–2029 and argues that very low fees could still produce substantial revenue at sufficiently high transaction volumes.

Neuner argues that ETH/BTC’s breakout after nine years and smaller altcoins’ upward trend against Bitcoin indicate stronger use cases beyond Bitcoin’s store-of-value role; he contrasts this with the ICO and DeFi rallies, which he says lacked lasting use cases. His thesis is that altcoins will lead this bull market, while the earlier 9x and roughly 6x altcoin rallies are historical comparisons, not a forecast of repeated returns.

Neuner says crypto’s bull-market case should rest on actual protocol use and revenue, not price gains alone: he cites daily revenue of $1 million–$5 million for Pump Fun and roughly $3 million–$5 million for Hyperliquid. He contrasts that standard with the 2017 and 2021 cycles, which he characterizes as driven by promises rather than established use cases.

Neuner argues that network growth does not necessarily create token value unless supply is scarce, and that fully diluted valuation can obscure the supply actually available to trade. His screening approach therefore considers tradable supply, scheduled emissions, staking, buyback pressure, and user growth relative to available liquidity.