In a recent post on X, Bitwise Europe highlighted the impressive trajectory of NEAR, a Layer 1 blockchain that's carving out a niche as AI infrastructure in the crypto world. If you're new to this, a Layer 1 blockchain is the foundational network where all the magic happens, like Ethereum or Solana, handling transactions and smart contracts directly.

NEAR was co-founded by Illia Polosukhin and started as an AI research project before pivoting to blockchain. Today, it's all about enabling user-controlled AI agents across digital ecosystems via decentralized coordination. While most of its 41.5 million monthly users are still dipping into non-AI apps, the project's roadmap is laser-focused on bridging that gap.

The roadmap breaks down into three phases. Phase 1 is about beefing up the Layer 1 with sharding—splitting the network into smaller pieces for better scalability—and dynamic resharding to handle spikes in activity. Phase 2 rolls out user-friendly tools like Chain Signatures and Intents, making cross-chain interactions smoother. This sets the stage for AI agents to hop between networks seamlessly. Finally, Phase 3 flips the script from building infrastructure to actually coordinating those decentralized AI agents.

One standout highlight from the post is the explosive growth in Near Intents. These are essentially a protocol for multichain financial products, ditching centralized exchanges for something more decentralized. For the week starting November 10, 2025, Near Intents clocked in at a whopping $969 million in trading volume. Looking ahead, based on Q3's quarter-over-quarter growth from a higher base, projections suggest this could balloon to over $10 billion weekly by June 2026. That's a tenfold jump, which could supercharge NEAR as it links up with other blockchains and becomes a hub for cross-chain messaging and value transfers.

Instead of cranking out AI models themselves, NEAR's vibe is about giving users control through a trust-minimized, decentralized setup. Key pieces include DCML for private data vaults, MCP for secure collaborations with memory features, and AITP as a developer toolkit to make AI agents safe and easy to use. Real-world stuff is already live, like Agent Hub, NEAR AI, and hotpotato.fun, where autonomous systems are handling big money flows. This is laying the groundwork for an AI-driven economy on the blockchain.

NEAR's token economics are tuned to grab value from AI activities, including fees from intent routing, infrastructure services, and model executions—going way beyond just selling block space like traditional chains.

This update from Bitwise Europe tags in folks like @cornMaxy, @Andre_Dragosch, and NEAR's own team, signaling strong community and institutional interest. As blockchain practitioners, keeping an eye on NEAR could unlock insights into how AI and crypto are merging, potentially influencing meme tokens and beyond in this evolving space.