Coinbase Global today announced a product called “Coinbase for Agents.” It aims to provide AI agents with direct access to user accounts, allowing them to retrieve market data and execute cryptocurrency trades, as well as allow users to pay for services within limits set by them.
The platform works with AI assistants like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude through Model Context Protocol (MCP) integration of web-based tools, and also includes a separate command-line interface (CLI) for developers, said Lincoln Marr, head of AI products at Coinbase. Terminal-based environments such as Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, and Hermes Agent are supported through the CLI version.
“We believe that agents are no longer a niche developer curiosity, but are actually the primary way people interact with the internet,” Ma said.
Coinbase agent functionality
Users can ask their agents to help them with multiple actions, such as executing a trading strategy based on an investment plan, a one-off analysis of a specific position, or even a complete rebalancing of the entire portfolio. Agents work with Coinbase Advanced, the company’s specialized trading layer, for both analysis and execution.
Upon launch, connected AI agents will be granted permission to trade across Coinbase’s spot crypto and derivatives markets. The exchange plans to add stock and prediction markets later.
On the payment side, the agent uses x402, an open protocol Coinbase co-developed with AWS, Anthropic, Circle, and Near. Through x402, agents can purchase premium research data and on-demand computing resources without subscriptions or human approval. According to The Next Web, the protocol has processed 75 million transactions and $24 million in transaction value in the past 30 days.
“Unlike pure trading platforms, we are the only one that combines exchange access with native payment protocols,” Ma said. “We aim to build fundamentally different products for a future where much of the internet is accessed through agents.”
Security risks in the growth of the AI agent industry
The security risks are very serious, as AI-powered cryptocurrency exploits drained $600 million from decentralized finance protocols in April alone. Agents authorized to transact and spend introduce new potential points of entry for bad actors.
Coinbase says it now allows agents to manage a portfolio separate from a user’s main holdings, as well as integrated custom management features such as spending limits, trading limits, and limits on the services agents are allowed to access.
The AI agent industry is growing rapidly. Robinhood (HOOD) just announced its own AI agent product last month, and crypto payments company MoonPay launched MoonAgents, a desktop app that connects Claude and OpenAI Codex to crypto wallets and blockchain services earlier this month.
Taking a short break from cryptocurrencies, Mastercard this week introduced Agent Pay for Machines, an autonomous machine-to-machine payments platform backed by over 30 partners including Coinbase, Stripe, Cloudflare, and Ripple.
Alongside the agent launch, Coinbase also introduced Coinbase Advisor. It’s an in-app financial advisor, which the company describes as SEC and CFTC registered, and provides AI-powered recommendations directly from the Coinbase app.
The cryptocurrency exchange also cited predictions that autonomous agents could account for up to 20% of e-commerce transactions by 2030.
