Single Integration for AI Commerce

Mastercard has introduced Agent Connect, a platform that gives merchants one connection to engage with AI shopping agents, digital platforms and payment providers. The service supports product discovery, cart creation and payments that require explicit consumer approval, allowing businesses to participate in AI-assisted shopping without building separate technical links for each platform.

Merchants can supply up-to-date prices, product details and availability directly from their existing catalogs. This approach aims to keep information accurate when AI agents recommend items or prepare orders, even if the shopper never visits a traditional product page. Businesses retain authority over branding, pricing and customer relationships throughout the process rather than being limited to order fulfillment.

Agent Connect forms part of Mastercard’s broader Agent Suite for Merchants. The expanded suite enables product searches, comparisons, recommendations and checkout inside merchant-controlled digital channels. It also extends to post-purchase activities, including order tracking, refunds and returns handled by AI agents.

Partnership and Authorization Controls

Mastercard is collaborating with Anthropic to provide merchants a commerce agent blueprint that pairs Claude models with its payment capabilities. The tools allow businesses to develop their own AI shopping agents while maintaining control of their digital storefronts and commercial terms.

Complementing the platform is Agent Pay, which manages transactions initiated by AI agents. The system relies on tokenized permissions that record a customer’s authorization before any purchase can proceed. This mechanism verifies that the agent is acting within the buyer’s instructions and prevents unauthorized spending.

Lambert added that Mastercard’s goal is for businesses to keep control as AI reshapes online shopping.

Support for Machine-to-Machine Payments

Mastercard has also advanced Agent Pay for Machines, designed for frequent, low-value automated transactions between software applications or connected devices. These payments can settle over card networks or stablecoin rails under predefined spending limits and authorization rules set by the owner.

More than 30 companies back the machine-payment effort. Participants include Stripe, Coinbase, Adyen, Checkout.com, Cloudflare, OKX, Global Payments and Ripple. The initiative builds on earlier work that brought blockchain and traditional payment infrastructure together for programmable settlement.

The initial rollout of the new AI commerce tools focuses on U.S. consumers and involves partners such as Samsung, Trip.com and Brazilian digital services firm Bemobi. Mastercard already applies artificial intelligence across roughly one-third of its services and is positioning the Agent Suite as an extension of that capability into consumer and automated commerce.