The x402 track on the cusp of opportunity: Gold mining or landmine sweeping?

Many friends who claim to have an IQ of 50 always want a clear answer on how to choose targets in the x402 track. They all want to ride the wave of “The Wind Rises” and win easily. I can only say congratulations to the friends who have taken the lead in following the x402 track, but if you want to win easily? The risks are just too great.

1. At this stage, we are in the x402 chaos period, where Devs, VCs, CEXs, and Builders have yet to reach a consensus and cannot form an effective synergy. However, it is precisely at this time that projects trying to take advantage of the situation and create chaos will emerge one after another, making investment increasingly difficult.

You think you are panning for gold, but in reality, you are clearing mines.

2. Many people wonder why such a sexy track has such a scarcity of valuable assets?

Due to the sudden popularity of the x402 track, the genuine x402 project is hesitating through a mediocre life. The sudden influx of traffic has left them at a loss, and most of the projects have incomplete functions, looking like low-quality ones. The AI-related projects that have already issued coins thought they would be down for the count, but were suddenly revived by an electric shock. However, whether they can truly seize the x402 opportunity and come back to life, or if it's just a brief moment of brilliance, remains completely unclear.

The real goods are not ready yet, while the fakes are eager to take the place.

3. This x402 trend is different from the previous engravings craze and AI Agent craze. Although both are fueled by the expectations of alternative “asset issuance,” the hype around x402 is supported by AI payments, compared to the expectations of gold engraving and chatbots.

A great opportunity to traverse the barriers between Crypto and the internet, using blockchain infrastructure + stablecoin circulation to disrupt the traditional internet advertising business model.

This prevents people from web2 from dismissing it as a “web3 scam” and allows people in web3 AI to finally stand tall and say, “We have real use cases.”

The new and old revolutionaries finally have a foundation for equal dialogue;

4. The threshold for the x402 track is very low, especially the technical threshold, because it is too easy to affiliate with the x402 concept:

A project party can simply Transfer money and issue tokens in the name of x402 to blatantly raise funds; a hacker can easily Mint through front-end + back-end phishing to steal money in the name of x402; many project parties can pose as x402 old OGs just by forwarding a regular contract for upgrades; some wallet service providers might just add an AI feature to automatically initiate transfers and become x402 native…

I do not completely deny the efforts of these projects to integrate the x402 protocol, but what Chaos fears the most in its early days is the perfunctory approach with low barriers, which disappoints the enthusiasm of retail investors.

Because the true greatness of x402 lies not in its technology, not in its products, but in its business vision.

To enable the AI Agent to achieve seamless and smooth payments, to allow the AI Agent to automatically and securely execute matching transactions according to predetermined conditions, to ensure that the underlying infra can handle transaction loads comparable to VISA, and to adapt to a series of upstream and downstream infrastructure, etc., this massive infra construction, optimization, adaptation, experience, and other “demands” have forged a consensus among everyone: the track is about to take off.

This is the future of x402 that we all expect.