Payments giant Visa is opening its Intelligent Commerce platform to businesses worldwide, expanding the infrastructure that allows artificial intelligence (AI) agents to shop, compare, and complete purchases on behalf of consumers and enterprises.
The move comes one week after Visa published its Business-to-AI (B2AI) Report, which found that 53% of U.S. business leaders surveyed would allow AI agents to negotiate prices or terms directly with other AI agents on their behalf. The report also found that 71% of businesses said they are willing to optimize products, offers, and experiences specifically for AI agents, while 77% are already using or piloting AI in their operations.
On the consumer side, nearly 40% of Americans reported making a purchase they normally would not have considered as a result of using an AI agent or tool, an early signal that autonomous systems are actively shaping demand rather than merely filtering it.
Visa’s Intelligent Commerce framework provides a suite of integrated APIs spanning tokenization, authentication, payment instructions, and transaction signals, enabling AI agents to transact securely on behalf of users.
Pilot programs have already been running across multiple regions. In Asia-Pacific and Europe, pilots launched in early 2026, while readiness work is underway in Latin America and the Caribbean. In the Middle East, Visa is working with developer Aldar to allow customers in the United Arab Emirates to use AI agents to pay recurring fees like real estate service charges.
A core component of the framework is the Trusted Agent Protocol, an open framework introduced in October 2025 that helps merchants distinguish between malicious bots and legitimate AI agents acting on behalf of consumers.
Heated Race
Visa’s global push arrives amid intensifying competition over who will control the payment rails for AI agent commerce. Two crypto-native protocols are racing to become foundational infrastructure for AI payments: Coinbase’s x402 standard, which recently moved under Linux Foundation governance with backing from Google, Stripe, and Visa itself, and the Machine Payments Protocol (MPP), launched by Stripe’s Tempo blockchain.
On the crypto front, Visa has been hedging its bets. Visa Crypto Labs launched the CLI tool in March, a command-line payment interface that lets AI agents make payments without API keys or pre-funded accounts — directly targeting the same autonomous agent use cases that crypto protocols are pursuing. The company also expanded its stablecoin collaboration with Bridge in March, with plans to bring stablecoin-linked cards to over 100 countries.
The competing approaches highlight a growing fault line in the industry. Traditional payments players like Visa and Mastercard are building trust layers on top of existing card rails, while crypto proponents argue that blockchain infrastructure is better suited for a world in which AI agents are first-class economic actors.
Visa’s CMO Frank Cooper III framed the company’s vision in terms of its B2AI framework, describing a shift where commerce moves from market-to-human to market-to-machine, with AI agents evaluating, negotiating, and transacting on behalf of people.
This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.
