Circle's 'Steve' AI Agents Autonomously Bet on 2026 World Cup Matches

Circle deployed eight autonomous AI agents with USDC wallets to predict 2026 World Cup outcomes via Polymarket, demonstrating fully automated decision-making and payment flows without human oversight.

Woofun AI reports that Circle Internet Group executed an experiment titled 'Steve,' deploying eight autonomous AI agents built on Vercel's 'eve' framework and the Circle Agent Stack. Each agent held an independent USDC wallet and initial capital, tasked with maximizing profits by predicting the final three matches of the 2026 World Cup. The agents independently accessed services like BlockRun markets via the x402 protocol and placed prediction orders on Polymarket, operating without real-time human intervention. All transactions and balance updates were publicly displayed in real time.

Safety protocols enforced strict limits on single payments and total wallet balances, which no agent exceeded. Following the experiment, approximately $10,000 in remaining funds from the eight accounts will be donated to the Apache Software Foundation, with Circle Impact matching the contribution 1:1 for a total exceeding $20,000. Circle clarified that it does not operate 'Steve' or manage user funds, and the project is unrelated to FIFA or the official World Cup organization. The company plans to enable developers to build similar autonomous agents using this open-source architecture.