Jordi Visser, a former Morgan Stanley managing director and former chief investment officer at Weiss Multi-Strategy Advisers, believes cryptocurrencies could offer stronger returns from the artificial-intelligence boom than AI stocks themselves. The founder of Visser Labs says the rapid gains already made by AI-related equities will be increasingly difficult to repeat, while AI agents could create fresh demand for crypto payments and tokenized assets.
Speaking to Cointelegraph’s Trade Secrets, Visser said he would not expect the current crypto bull market without AI. His view has also influenced his own portfolio: although Bitcoin remains his largest holding, he has expanded beyond Bitcoin, Ether and Solana into a wider group of tokens.
Why Visser links AI agents to crypto
Visser’s central argument is that AI agents could become a new interface for financial activity. In his scenario, people would give software instructions to carry out trades and other transactions, with the agents handling execution on their behalf.
He compares the potential impact of AI agents on crypto with the role that smartphones and the App Store played in expanding access to digital services. If more users rely on agents, he expects activity to grow in crypto payments and tokenized assets, rather than being concentrated only in companies that provide computing infrastructure.
The thesis extends an existing debate about how artificial intelligence could affect digital-asset demand. A tokenized asset is a digital representation of an asset or financial instrument recorded on a blockchain, while crypto payments use digital tokens to transfer value. Visser’s argument is that agents could increase the practical use of both.
However, he also sees a major risk to his outlook. A sharp downturn in AI could weigh on equity markets and temporarily undermine crypto prices. Visser said such a decline would not necessarily end the crypto bull market, but could retest recent lows.
Visser says AI’s biggest stock gains may be behind it
Visser said he began cutting his exposure to memory-chip maker Micron in mid-May after deciding that hedge funds and retail investors had become heavily concentrated in the AI trade. In his view, the intense focus on AI also contributed to a difficult period for Bitcoin and Ether.
The AI investment case had been supported by strong revenue figures. Microsoft reported on April 29 that its AI business was producing revenue at an annualized rate of $37 billion, more than twice the level of a year earlier. Micron said in March that fiscal second-quarter revenue had almost tripled to $23.86 billion.
Even so, Visser believes the market has entered a more demanding phase. His 100-stock AI portfolio is up roughly 40% this year, but over a rolling 126-day period it has become more volatile than Bitcoin.
He also points to the funding required to build AI infrastructure. Companies are spending heavily before their existing operations generate enough cash to cover those investments. Oracle, for example, recorded $55.7 billion in capital expenditure in fiscal 2026 compared with $32 billion in operating cash flow, and raised $43 billion through debt financing.
Visser’s distinction is not that artificial-intelligence development has ended. Rather, he says the period of dramatic stock-market gains—the AI “fireworks show”—has passed. He still expects computing demand from AI agents to grow for several years, but believes investors should moderate their expectations for returns from AI shares.
A broader crypto portfolio and the current market
Until August, Visser said his crypto holdings were limited to Bitcoin, Ether and Solana. He has since begun buying a wider range of tokens. Bitcoin remains his largest position, while Dogecoin serves as one indicator of whether retail investors are returning to the market.
Visser considers retail participation important to the continuation of a broad crypto rally. He tracks the wider market through an equally weighted index containing 42 tokens and four publicly traded companies. According to Visser, the index has outperformed Bitcoin since June, and he intends to retain all of its constituents.
Privacy is another theme in his portfolio. Rather than backing one company, Visser said he believes in the broader importance of privacy and identity protection. He named Zcash and Monero as projects that fit this view, arguing that the expansion of AI could make privacy more important as fraud and other abuse increase.
Moneyiar market data at 22:39 on October 25, 2026, showed Bitcoin at $80,430.51, down 0.08% over 24 hours and 1.32% over seven days. Ether was priced at $2,342.06, up 0.02% in 24 hours but down 1.77% over seven days. Solana stood at $101.60, up 0.03% on the day and down 1.52% for the week. VeChain was at $0.006818, with a 24-hour decline of 0.08% and a seven-day gain of 2.82%.
Visser’s broader message is that the relationship between AI and crypto may develop through usage as much as through investment. AI infrastructure remains part of the story, but he expects agents to create additional demand for digital payments, tokenized assets and privacy-focused networks.
