Australia's 40-Year Economic Outlook Highlights AI Revolution But Omits Crypto

Australia's Treasury has published its latest Intergenerational Report, a 40-year economic outlook that names artificial intelligence as one of five major transitions set to reshape the nation's economy — yet makes no mention of cryptocurrency or digital assets. The report, released Monday, described agentic AI systems as having become "significantly" more capable, autonomous, and widely used, noting they now surpass human-level performance on certain tasks. AI joins geopolitical conflicts, an aging population, a shift to clean energy, and Australia's transition toward a services-based industrial economy on the list of transformative forces.

Coinbase Australia country director John O'Loghlen criticized the omission, arguing the document overlooks the financial infrastructure that AI agents will ultimately depend on. "The Intergenerational Report makes it clear that Australia's prosperity over the next 40 years will depend heavily on our ability to adopt new technology and lift productivity," O'Loghlen said in emailed comments. "And while the report focuses heavily on artificial intelligence, it completely misses the financial infrastructure those agents will need." Previous Intergenerational Reports have similarly avoided the topic of digital assets.

The crypto community's frustration is notable given parallel momentum from Australian regulators. The Reserve Bank of Australia has ramped up its focus on tokenized finance and infrastructure upgrades earlier this year, and the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre has estimated digital finance innovations could generate 24 billion Australian dollars ($17.1 billion) in annual economic gains. Meanwhile, a separate Treasury publication — the Financial Innovation Strategy released on September 3 — directly addresses the link between AI and financial infrastructure, noting that agentic systems could drive growth in automated and machine-to-machine transactions that demand real-time, interoperable, and programmable settlement layers. O'Loghlen pointed to Australia's Digital Asset Platform framework as progress, but urged regulators to apply the same clarity to stablecoin tokenized stored-value facilities and tokenized markets — the infrastructure he says "digital finance, agentic finance included, will run on."