{"slug": "token-economy-emerging-as-ai-use-soars-in-china-experts-tell-conference", "title": "‘Token economy’ emerging as AI use soars in China, experts tell conference", "summary": "Chinese tech experts said at the China Internet Conference that daily AI token consumption in China surged more than 1,000-fold in two years, exceeding 140 trillion tokens in March, giving rise to a 'token economy' where tokens serve as a new production factor linking AI capability, computing resources, and commercial value.", "body_md": "# ‘Token economy’ emerging as AI use soars in China, experts tell conference\n\nDaily AI token consumption has surged more than 1,000-fold in just over two years and exceeded 140 trillion tokens a day in March\n\n[Ben Jiang](/author/ben-jiang)in Beijing\n\nChinese tech industry experts say the rapidly increasing use of AI tokens is giving rise to a token-based economy, with the tiny units underpinning artificial intelligence services evolving beyond a technical metric and into the basis for delivering and pricing AI services.\n\n[token economy](https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3347495/how-china-could-dominate-ai-eras-tokenomics-vast-power-grids-and-low-cost-models?module=inline&pgtype=article)is emerging,” Yin Hao, an academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said on Wednesday while delivering a keynote speech at the China Internet Conference in Beijing.\n\nTokens are the fundamental units that AI models use to process and generate information. They are also the building blocks that underpin tasks ranging from chatbot conversations to image and film-quality video production.\n\nYin said tokens were more than just a technical metric, and had become a new production factor that connected AI model capability, computing resources and commercial value.\n\nAI token usage has risen rapidly in China, with daily AI token consumption surging more than 1,000-fold in just over two years, rising from around 100 billion tokens a day at the start of 2024 to 100 trillion by the end of last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.\n\nDaily usage exceeded 140 trillion tokens in March, equivalent to roughly 100,000 tokens per person based on the country’s population of about 1.4 billion.\n\nThe surge in AI token usage comes as companies across the country increasingly adopt AI to boost productivity and automate business operations.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/token-economy-emerging-as-ai-use-soars-in-china-experts-tell-conference", "canonical_source": "https://www.scmp.com/tech/article/3359974/token-economy-emerging-ai-use-soars-china-experts-tell-conference?utm_source=rss_feed", "published_at": "2026-07-09 11:00:09+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-07-09 11:23:08.410644+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-infrastructure", "ai-products"], "entities": ["Yin Hao", "Chinese Academy of Sciences", "China Internet Conference", "National Bureau of Statistics"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/token-economy-emerging-as-ai-use-soars-in-china-experts-tell-conference", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/token-economy-emerging-as-ai-use-soars-in-china-experts-tell-conference.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/token-economy-emerging-as-ai-use-soars-in-china-experts-tell-conference.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/token-economy-emerging-as-ai-use-soars-in-china-experts-tell-conference.jsonld"}}