October 20, 2026, 8:00 a.m. (JST)
[United States] “Money20/20,” a global financial event, is being held in Las Vegas, USA, from October 18 to 21, 2025. On the 18th, the winners of the 2nd annual Money Awards were announced, and an awards ceremony was held.
The Future of Finance: AI Agents and Blockchain
Sunday Night Live and the Annual Money Awards This evening marked the convergence of three pivotal moments in fintech.Scarlet Seiber, Chief Strategy Officer of Money20/20, and Dan Morehead, founder of Pantera Capital, engaged in a discussion about the future of AI agents and blockchain-based finance.
Moorehead, who has been identifying opportunities in emerging markets for 20 years, explored a future in which AI agents autonomously execute trades on behalf of customers and use blockchain technology to transfer funds without human intervention.
“A few months ago, the volume of traffic generated by AI agents on the internet surpassed that generated by humans,” said Mr. Morehead.AI doesn’t need to open a bank account. It will move directly to the blockchain. That’s because it can create a blockchain wallet in seconds and send money to anyone on Earth, anywhere, virtually for free, in near real time, 365 days a year.They won’t have to go out of their way to walk into town just to deal with a bank branch manager or bring utility bills and passports—all just to conduct transactions for eight hours a day, five days a week,” he said.
In addition, the Live Money Awards were held to honor this year’s outstanding companies. The Money Awards recognized outstanding innovation in the global FinTech industry and honored the companies, products, and partnerships that have shaped the future of financial services.
Achievements Recognized Across 6 Categories
This year, more than 40 industry leaders served as judges. The awards recognized achievements across six categories: Startup Early Stage, Startup Growth Stage, Banking,Payments, Partnerships & Strategic Alliances, and Diamond. They highlighted a wide range of innovations, from emerging startups to long-established financial institutions.
Discussion on Demonstrating Humanity in an AI-Driven Economy
As a result, the winners were: Charm Security for “Startup Early Stage,” Trace Finance for “Startup Growth Stage,” Omnisient for “Banking,” Privy, a Stripe Company, for “Payments,” SOOHO.IO for “Partnerships & Strategic Alliance,” and Bolttech for “Diamond.”
A discussion was held between Alex Brania, CEO of Tools for Humanity, and Bam Azizi, CEO of Mesh, on digital identity and proving humanity in an increasingly AI-driven economy.The two discussed how AI agents are transforming the digital economy and why proving human identity will become increasingly important as autonomous agents begin to conduct transactions and interact online.
Mr. Brania said, “One of our core beliefs was that the future would be one of agency.They will be able to act with a long-term perspective and create videos. They will be able to behave like humans in the digital space, and when that happens, the concept of human-to-human interaction on the internet will completely collapse. We will need a means to prove that we are human, and such technology will serve as a kind of gatekeeper for nearly every transaction on the internet,” said Mr. Brania.
