Yesterday, a special golden dog was born on Base, and it is $PING. Based on the cost of minting and the current coin price, a successful mint yields approximately 18 times the investment.

The uniqueness of $PING lies in its minting process, which evokes memories of inscriptions from two years ago. The cost to mint one $PING is about 1 dollar, and if successful, one can obtain 5000 $PING. The minting page for $PING, like the inscriptions from back then, lacks a fancy front-end interface, appearing quite hardcore.

This is the first token issued through the x402 protocol. So, what is the x402 protocol? Why is the minting process of $PING so special? What is the current ecological situation of this protocol?

What is the x402 Protocol?

x402 is an open payment protocol developed by Coinbase that enables AI agents to autonomously complete transactions.

The x402 protocol utilizes the long-standing "HTTP 402 Payment Required" status code to require payment to complete API requests or load web pages. If an API request lacks payment information, x402 will return an HTTP 402 status code, prompting the client to pay and retry the request.

The following workflow diagram intuitively explains how the x402 protocol operates:

(Image source: Jay Yu – Pantera Capital)

A user makes a request to Claude, "Using my Coinbase wallet, help me buy a pair of jeans on Amazon." After receiving the request, the AI initiates a purchase request to Amazon, which constructs a preliminary transaction including the wallet address to be used, the chain to be used, the currency, and the specific amount. Upon receiving this, the AI sends the transaction to the x402 protocol validator to check if the corresponding wallet on the corresponding chain has sufficient assets, if the goods are tradable, and if the user has confirmed authorization. Once all is completed, the amount and payment proof are sent to the merchant's address. The transaction is now complete.

Overall, the HTTP 402 status code serves as a "communication" mechanism in the protocol to indicate whether a transaction is successful. Coinbase built upon this status code, adding the functionality of using blockchain for payments, thus creating the x402 protocol.

It sounds simple, but from the protocol flow above, there are two exciting aspects. First, the channel for on-chain assets to be used for actual payments is further simplified; users do not need to convert assets into fiat currency before spending but can directly use USDT, USDC, or other on-chain assets for consumption. However, the key to this is widespread adoption, requiring enough merchants to support it.

Any Web API or content provider (crypto or Web2) that wants to offer low-cost, frictionless payment paths for small or usage-based transactions can integrate x402.

The second point is the AI Agent. As a payer/receiver, AI Agents are quite compatible with blockchain payments because they do not naturally possess bank or payment app accounts like humans do through KYC. As the intelligence of AI Agents continues to improve, novel consumption experiences or on-chain experiences are also worth looking forward to.

The workflow also explains why the minting process of $PING resembles inscriptions, as it requires confirmation from the x402 validator. During the minting process, a large number of minting requests not only overwhelmed the minting interface repeatedly but also provided the x402 protocol with a real pressure test.

Data from the past 30 days shows that the $PING interface has received over 150,000 x402 transactions, amounting to approximately $140,000, far surpassing the second-ranked Questflow.

This is the first time in nearly half a year since the launch of the x402 protocol that it has been so lively and well-known. Regardless of the chain or protocol, the issuance of new assets is always a lasting hot topic in the crypto space.

x402 Ecosystem Overview

So, besides $PING, what other projects under the x402 protocol are worth paying attention to?

The Ecosystem page on the x402 protocol's official website summarizes the current projects. If you click into each project, you will feel that this protocol is still in a relatively early stage of development. Many links lead directly to technical documentation or redirect to GitHub projects.

Here, we summarize some projects that already have tokens or are about to issue tokens.

Questflow

A multi-AI Agent workflow layer that allows multiple AI Agents to autonomously coordinate and execute tasks. Announced in July this year, it completed a $6.5 million seed round led by cyber•Fund, with participation from Delphi Labs, Systemic Ventures, Eden Block, HashKey Capital, Animoca Brands, Tezos, and received grants from Coinbase Developer Platform, Aptos, and Virtuals.

Currently, there is no official token, but last December, it launched $SWARM in collaboration with Virtuals, an autonomous Agent cluster utilizing Questflow's QDP (Questflow Developer Platform) and MAOP (Multi-Agent Orchestration Protocol).

$SWARM currently has a market cap of approximately $4.5 million.

AurraCloud

An AI Agent infrastructure aimed at crypto-native applications. It can immediately host AI Agents using OpenAI-compatible APIs or MCP servers and monetize AI through the on-chain x402 protocol on Base.

Additionally, earlier this month, the project also provided x402 verification services.

The token $AURA was launched through Virtuals and currently has a market cap of approximately $1.6 million.

Meridian

Incubated by uOS, it provides multi-chain settlement and custody services for the x402 protocol.

The token $MRDN currently has a market cap of approximately $1.5 million.

PayAI

Provides multi-chain x402 payment service support, including Solana, and also offers x402 verification services.

The token $PAYAI currently has a market cap of approximately $5 million.

Daydreams

Supports the LLM inference process for applications and AI Agents using x402. It is also building Lucid—a platform where anyone can deploy Daydreams Agents to solve problems, with users signing transactions to pay in USDC via x402, and Agents can pay each other for access.

The token $dreams currently has a market cap of approximately $6.7 million.

Gloria AI

A real-time news platform built for traders, creators, AI Agents, and automated systems, which can be paid for services using $GLORIA through x402.

The token $GLORIA currently has a market cap of approximately $1.65 million.

Kite AI

Kite AI builds a foundational trading layer for the "Agentic Internet," providing unified identity, payment, and governance infrastructure for autonomous agents. What Kite AI is doing is closely related to x402; it mentioned support for x402 as early as July and can be considered the only project in the x402 ecosystem that can be classified as a "chain."

On September 2, according to Fortune, Kite AI announced the completion of a total financing of $33 million, with the latest Series A funding amounting to $18 million, led by PayPal Ventures and General Catalyst, with participation from 8VC, Samsung Next, SBI US Gateway Fund, Vertex Ventures, Hashed, HashKey Capital, Dispersion Capital, Alumni Ventures, Avalanche Foundation, GSR Markets, LayerZero, Animoca Brands, Essence VC, and Alchemy.

Kite AI has not yet issued a token, but recently launched the Kite Foundation X account, which is clearly set to issue a token and should do so soon. The currently tradable related asset is the officially launched FLY THE KITE NFT, with a floor price of 0.375 ETH.

Conclusion

In September of this year, Coinbase and Cloudflare announced the joint establishment of the x402 Foundation to promote the development of the protocol. Although there are some similar competitors, such as bitGPT's h402 and Radius's EVMAuth, there is no doubt that x402 has the strongest background and the highest level of attention.

If the market capitalization of $PING significantly increases in the coming period, x402 will gain more market attention. This is beneficial not only for meme coins but also for infrastructure projects.

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