DeFi is already where AI wants to be

AI and decentralised finance are travelling the same path from hype to application, yet at different speeds. For both, the story communications teams choose to tell now will shape what comes next.

Over the last two decades, the media has settled into a recognisable pattern for covering new technology — the shape Gartner’s analysts call the hype cycle: excitement, scepticism, and eventually, integration.

Measured by sheer buzz, artificial intelligence (AI) is far ahead of decentralised finance (DeFi). But measured against the hype cycle, there is a strong case to make that DeFi is the more advanced of the two. That matters for where each should concentrate communications.

AI surges upwards

AI dominates headlines. Ongoing discussions about regulation, investment and capabilities have people excited, but this same excitement is triggering critical questions surrounding the actual application and use of AI.

Take hallucinations, the tendency of AI systems to present false information and build on those falsehoods. Researcher Damien Charlotin’s AI Hallucination Cases database has catalogued more than 1,353 cases of AI-generated hallucinated content in court filings. A German appellate court in May ruled that a company is liable for the erroneous answers provided by their chatbot. The promise of AI is higher efficiency, but every output now has to be independently verified, which costs the resource AI was meant to save.

The media openly debate whether AI company valuations match current revenue. OpenAI’s roughly $850 billion valuation implies the company will generate $50 billion or more in annual revenue within a few years. OpenAI may delay its IPO until 2027 so that it can reach a $1 trillion valuation.

The questions are only getting bigger, with rising unease about the concentration of power. A growing chorus classifies the AI boom less as a pure technology story and more as a question about who controls the rails of the next economy: see the decision by the US government to ban the export of Anthropic’s latest AI models.

AI hype is approaching a crescendo. The technology is entering a new media reporting phase, one that will be more critical of its application, development and projections.

DeFi quietly strides forward

If we look at DeFi, a different picture emerges. It has already overcome a period of sceptical media coverage and become more widely accepted as an integral component of the mainstream financial system.

Retail interest in cryptocurrencies, and breathless coverage of Bitcoin, Ethereum and meme coins – unregulated, prone to wild swings – compounded that scepticism. That unfamiliarity meant journalists often lumped cryptocurrencies in with stablecoins, CBDCs and blockchain. For a time, they were quick to write off DeFi’s future as a short-term trend.

Specific Web3 applications like blockchain and tokenised assets demonstrate the shift. Away from the noise of the hype cycle, a cohort of innovative companies has been working quietly in the background, building the financial plumbing that large institutions need to solve long-standing pain points such as slow settlement, expensive cross-border payments, and infrastructure still running on decades-old systems. The result is the slow but steady adoption of DeFi technologies by these institutions alongside acquisitions.

An integrated ecosystem

AI and DeFi are contrasts. One is cresting a wave of expectation, while the other is demonstrating practical advantages.

AI companies, particularly those competing with the giants, will need to counter negative sentiment spanning everything from AI washing to data ownership, all the while leveraging existing networks to develop a client book, win consideration for tenders, and build a stream of revenue. The aim is to show that AI can be safely used and is not an industry built on hype. Over time, this will build trust and credibility, and in turn, promote wider adoption.

DeFi’s challenge is establishing a voice that celebrates achievements, linking the transactions they facilitate with deepening integration with traditional finance. The media want to see practical examples of how these technologies are being deployed to transform legacy institutions. Tell the story that demonstrates the narrative shift from hype to application.