Here’s why ai16Z surged over 35% today

Agentic AI platform ai16z launched its native token after its founder revealed details about the upcoming update to AI operating system Eliza.

According to Crypto.news data, ai16z (AI16Z) rose 35% to $1.27, an intraday high, on January 14, while its market value increased from $1 billion to approximately $1.4 billion at that time. The rise was fueled by increased trading activity, with daily volume rising 33% to $646 million in the past day. The altcoin was also trending on CoinGecko.

This increase coincided with the overall crypto market recovering from the recent pullback, adding further momentum to AI16Z’s price action.

AI16Z was picked up after Shaw, the project’s founder, shared details about the version 2 update to Eliza, the operating system that powers Agentic AI platform Eliza.

The update will reportedly offer a number of advanced features, including full autonomy for seamless operation, unified wallet abstraction for streamlined asset management, and an advanced plugin registry to support various integrations.

The rally gained further strength after Eliza’s official whitepaper was published on January 14.

Meanwhile, demand for the AI-powered meme coin has increased among derivatives traders. According to data from CoinGlass, open interest in the AI16Z futures market increased by 10% in the past day to $193.9 million at the time of writing.

Capitalizing on the recent AI Agentic excitement, whale investors have also shifted their focus to AI16Z. According to Lookonchain’s X post, a whale recently withdrew 5.64 million AI16Z tokens worth $6.37 million from the centralized exchange Gate.io. This whale currently holds a total of 15.95 million AI16Z tokens, worth approximately $17.86 million.

Meanwhile, smart money investors have reportedly started accumulating tokens. See below.

Crypto investors generally view such accumulation trends as bullish, especially for altcoins with smaller market caps.

AI16Z techniques appear to be on the rise

Technical indicators indicate that the current rally could potentially be extended.

AI16Z price, 50-day EMA and ADX chart | Source: crypto.news

The price of AI16Z is positioned above the 50-day Moving Average, which means the bulls are still in control. This is confirmed by the Average Direction Line indicator, which shows a value of 40. Typically a reading above 25 indicates strong trend strength.

AI16Z MACD and RSI chart | Source: crypto.news

Additionally, the size of the histogram bars on the Moving Average Convergence Divergence bars were also decreasing, a signal that the uptrend is reversing. Meanwhile, the Relative Strength Index was at 47, indicating that the altcoin has plenty of room for gains before hitting overbought territory.