Goldman Sachs earlier said: "Token use by AI agents is expected to multiply 24X by 2030"
AI agents are now creating the first serious cost test for the AI boom. As was reported this week, Uber and Microsoft are already rethinking expensive agent usage.
A chatbot may answer once, but an agent plans, calls tools, checks results, edits mistakes, and repeats the loop.
That loop can make one user request consume 10x, 50x, or even far more tokens than a normal answer.
Goldman’s bullish case is that monthly token use could reach 120 quadrillion by 2030, while inference cost per token keeps falling 60%-70% per year.
The fight is now between agent productivity and token waste.
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