DUBAI, UAE, Feb. 16, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Mantle, the high-performance distribution and liquidity layer for real-world assets, announced the official deployment of the ERC-8004 standard on mainnet. This milestone introduces a specialized trust and identity layer designed to transform AI agents from isolated scripts into sovereign economic participants capable of operating across RWAs, TradFi bridges, and DeFi.
The Trust Gap: Why AI Agents Were Problematic
Until now, on-chain AI agents have faced a "visibility crisis." Despite their ability to execute code, agents remained invisible to the broader financial system. They lacked a way to build a reputation across different platforms, approve their historical performance, or be discovered outside of the specific ecosystem where they were created.
This gap has prevented autonomous agents from participating in high-stakes financial markets where verifiable records are non-negotiable.
ERC-8004: The Three Components of Agent Autonomy
By deploying ERC-8004, Mantle provides the foundational infrastructure for a trustless "Internet of Agents." The standard introduces three critical on-chain registries:
- Identity Registry: Provides a verifiable, NFT-based on-chain identity for every agent, making them discoverable and unique.
- Reputation Registry: Establishes a portable track record. An agent's "credit score" or performance history now follows it across platforms, ending the need to start from zero.
- Validation Registry: Offers cryptographic proof of work completed, allowing agents to verify the accuracy of each other's outputs through stake-secured or ZK-based mechanisms.
"At Mantle, we are building the liquid layer for the future of finance, where RWAs and DeFi converge." said by Joshua Cheong, Head of Product at Mantle. "By bringing ERC-8004 to our ecosystem, we are providing AI agents with the 'credentials' they need to manage real capital. This isn't just about automation; it's about creating a verifiable workforce that can navigate compliance, liquidity, and settlement at scale."
Bridging the Gap in TradFi and RWAs with ERC-8004
On Mantle, where institutional-grade assets flow seamlessly, these agents serve as the "connective tissue." With ERC-8004, agents can now discover one another, verify credentials, and transact autonomously without being locked into a single platform. This enables three primary categories of autonomous building:
- Financial Strategy Agents: Executing complex yield or trading strategies with a performance history that anyone can audit.
- RWA Coordination Agents: Managing the heavy lifting of compliance, custody, and settlement for tokenized assets.
- Cross-Market Bridges: Bridging liquidity between traditional legacy systems and on-chain protocols by acting as verifiable intermediaries.
A Unified Ecosystem Is Now Powered by Mantle
ERC-8004 is designed to be backwards-compatible and works in tandem with the protocols agents already use, including the Model Context Protocol (MCP), Agent-to-Agent (A2A) communication, and the x402 payment standard.
By combining these communication and payment standards with Mantle's massive distribution layer and $4B+ treasury, the network is uniquely positioned to lead the "DeFAI" (Decentralized AI Finance) revolution.
Ethereum is the settlement layer for AI, and with ERC-8004, the future of autonomous finance is officially live on Mantle.
About Mantle
Mantle positions itself as the premier distribution layer and gateway for institutions and TradFi to connect with on-chain liquidity and access real-world assets, powering how real-world finance flows.
With over $4B+ in community-owned assets, Mantle combines credibility, liquidity and scalability with institutional-grade infrastructure to support large-scale adoption. The ecosystem is anchored by $MNT within Bybit, and built out through core ecosystem projects like mETH, fBTC, MI4 and more. This is complemented by Mantle Network's partnerships with leading issuers and protocols such as Ethena USDe, Ondo USDY, and OP-Succinct.
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