Sandra Leow is a researcher and analyst with experience spanning blockchain ecosystems, AI applications, and digital marketing. Her work focuses on data-driven insights and exploring the intersection of social dynamics, technology, and crypto. ^[1]

Education

Leow graduated from New York University (NYU) with a Bachelor’s in Finance in 2024. ^[2]

Career

Leow’s journey into crypto began approximately six years ago during her business finance studies at NYU. Initially focused on traditional finance, she became aware of crypto through early exposure to Bitcoin from her sister and an internship at Amber Group in Shanghai, where her mentor deepened her interest. Her family’s encouragement of creativity and discussions about emerging technologies inspired her to pursue unconventional career paths, eventually leading her to crypto and AI. During her internship, she gained insights into the industry and began publishing content on Twitter, adopting a data-driven approach to storytelling focused on decentralized applications and ecosystem developments.

Leow’s professional career started in 2016 when she became the head of fundraising at the 24 Hour Race, where she raised money to combat human trafficking. In 2018, she worked as a digital marketing intern at Emperikal, managing SEO, social media campaigns, and digital marketing strategies. In 2019, she joined IDEAS as a research assistant, analyzing data on Malaysia's palm oil industry and assisting with research and workshops.

In 2020, Leow co-founded Carbon Masks, leading branding, digital marketing, and manufacturing to achieve revenue and global distribution of face masks. In 2021, she interned as a research analyst at Amber Group, focusing on product development and crypto farming strategies. She joined Nansen in 2022, initially as a research intern managing content for Nansen Alpha and later advancing to research analyst and research manager roles. At Nansen, she specialized in on-chain data, created dashboards, produced market reports, and gained media exposure on platforms like Forbes and CoinTelegraph. In 2024, Leow transitioned to Kaito as a research partner, where she contributed to developing an AI-powered search engine for digital assets. ^{[3] [4]}

Interviews

AI Agents

On the More than Speculation podcast, Leow discussed the future of AI agents in the crypto space. During the interview, she explained why she went into AI agents: ^[4]

“I think, you know, the entire AI stack is so deep, and there are so many different types of verticals within the AI stack alone. I wanted to find a niche that I was personally interested in. I've always come from more of a consumer background, where I really enjoy using applications and want them to be easy enough for me to use and understand. There’s a lot of cool work being done in the compute space, like AI training, by professional experts in the field. However, I think there’s a lack of focus on the agentic part, which is so new but also closely tied to crypto. When you think about crypto, it’s still a very complex process—whether it’s going through different due diligence steps, deciding which bridges to use, or figuring out payment rails. It’s all still quite complicated. What agents are trying to do is make these processes easier.” 

“I don't think we've seen versions of agents that can fully achieve that yet, but I believe we’re going to see more of it emerging. What agents unlock is the ability for users to easily interact with applications, either through natural language questions, prompts, or simply initiating a task and having it completed. That’s where agents will truly make an impact—leveraging crypto's payment rails and infrastructure. Everything should be seamless, with agents transacting naturally and autonomously, something traditional technology was never able to offer. That’s why I think agents could be the major unlock for crypto, where people are using crypto without even realizing it, because it’s all handled by agents.”

When asked about what kind of AI integrations she’d like to see in the future, she responded: ^[4]

“So far, we've seen plenty of iterations with meme AI tokens like Zer, Bro, Goat, or Luna, which are essentially personalities. I think these personalities will continue to be a part of the space. However, I’m not sure if the current agents are the ones we’ll see evolving over the next few years. Personalities are a significant aspect of crypto because, when it comes to attention, people care more about individuals than projects.

In different ecosystems, people focus on the thought leaders behind those projects. That’s why personalities are something I’m paying attention to—specifically how teams feed new data into models, how these models evolve, and how interactions with humans change over time. Right now, what we’re seeing are “reply guys,” as you mentioned, but I’d like to see agents develop a core purpose. They should be more personable and able to understand tweets in a contextual way, rather than just generating random philosophical thoughts. While those are fine, they don’t engage me because I can tell it’s not genuine. I’d prefer more hyper-personalized interactions. This is just one part, but another area I’m focusing on is the infrastructure side of things.”