AI 中文总结
研究x402协议在商业中的代理程度，通过链上事件识别结算并确定真正付款人，对Base上的x402进行大规模测量，发现诸多问题，指出结算数量衡量的是可制造性而非采用情况。
AI 中文摘要
据说人工智能代理正在形成一种经济模式，它们自行支付所消耗的数据、应用程序编程接口（API）和计算资源费用。x402是为此在链上结算稳定币支付的最广泛部署协议，其数亿笔结算被视为该经济模式已到来的证据。我们指出结算数量不能等同于采用情况，因为这是利益相关方几乎可以免费制造的一个指标。我们首次对Base上的x402进行了大规模测量，并辅以更粗略的Solana普查。通过链上事件识别结算并通过元交易层确定真正付款人，我们根据支付图对每笔交易进行分类。在280天的窗口内，Base有价值44,121,383.81美元的136,708,672笔结算，集中在我们测量的各个轴上，但21.20%是虚构的，63.78%是关联集群内的内部结算。真正独立的部分是有界的，介于可证明用于可命名服务的187,861.35美元和无法证明是制造出来的20,258,746.09美元（占价值的45.92%）之间。最后，我们解析了结算数量中可制造的部分，即一个由运营商驱动的连贯经济模式，呈星形、机器定时且有气体补贴。结算数量衡量的是可制造性，而非采用情况。
英文摘要
AI agents are said to be forming an economy in which they pay, on their own, for the data, APIs, and compute they consume. x402, which settles a stablecoin payment on-chain for each purchase, is the most widely deployed protocol for this, and its hundreds of millions of settlements are read as proof that the economy has arrived. We show the count cannot be read as adoption: it is the one metric an interested party can manufacture almost for free, since the facilitator sponsors the gas and nothing on-chain marks who controls a payment. We give the first population-scale measurement of x402 on Base, supplemented with a coarser Solana census. Identifying settlements from their on-chain event and resolving the true payer through the meta-transaction layer, we sort each by what its trace can prove via a payment graph. Over a 280-day window Base carries 136{,}708{,}672 settlements worth \$44{,}121{,}383.81, concentrated on every axis we measure (payer, recipient, and value Gini all above 0.98), yet 21.20\% are fictitious and 63.78\% internal settlement within a linked cluster. What is genuinely independent is bounded: it lies between the \$187{,}861.35 that demonstrably reaches a nameable service and the \$20{,}258{,}746.09 (45.92\% of value) not provably manufactured. Finally, we resolve the count's manufacturable component, a coherent operator-driven economy, star-shaped, machine-timed, and gas-subsidized. Settlement count measures manufacturability, not adoption.
