AI agents are heading towards DeFi — Wallets are the weakest link

Without programmable infrastructure, DeFi risks becoming the next frontier for uncontrolled automation and financial exploitation. DeFi faces vulnerabilities that could hinder its development.

Opinion by: Sean Li, co-founder of Magic Labs

The cryptocurrency market operates 24/7. Human traders do not. As AI agents begin to manage liquidity, optimize profits, and execute trades at all times, they quickly become essential infrastructure for the future of decentralized finance (DeFi). While AI agents are evolving from tools suitable for quantum traders to mainstream financial operators, they are rapidly outpacing the wallets designed to secure them.

Advancements in abstracting accounts and smart contract wallets have emerged, but most DeFi platforms still primarily rely on externally owned account wallets, requiring manual approval at every step. Early-stage programmable solutions exist but remain fragmented, costly on layer 1 networks, and are adopted by only a small fraction of users.

As AI agents increasingly operate within DeFi, these infrastructure limitations become critical. We need standardized infrastructure that enables safe, cost-effective automation with verifiable barriers across multiple blockchain ecosystems.#DEFİ