--- title: AI agents are learning to spend money. Who will handle... description: AI agents are increasingly expected to make purchases autonomously, and a new payment infrastructure layer is emerging to support this. Mastercard launched... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/ai-agents-are-learning-to-spend-money-who-will-handle-the-payments--oahxtfqem twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: AI agents are learning to spend money. Who will handle the payments? | daily.dev og:description: AI agents are increasingly expected to make purchases autonomously, and a new payment infrastructure layer is emerging to support this. Mastercard launched... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/ai-agents-are-learning-to-spend-money-who-will-handle-the-payments--oahxtfqem og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/OaHXtfQEM.png og:image:alt: AI agents are learning to spend money. Who will handle the payments? og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # AI agents are learning to spend money. Who will handle the payments? **[The Next Web](https://daily.dev/sources/tnw)** · 5 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary AI agents are increasingly expected to make purchases autonomously, and a new payment infrastructure layer is emerging to support this. Mastercard launched Agent Pay for Machines in June for machine-to-machine micropayments, while XDC Network built XDC AI on Coinbase's x402 protocol, which repurposes the old HTTP 402 'Payment Required' status code to let agents pay for APIs and data without human checkout. The Linux Foundation now oversees the x402 Foundation, with 40 members including Mastercard, Visa, Stripe, American Express, Google, AWS, and Circle. Users can grant agents wallet access with spending limits, paying in USDC while XDC covers gas fees. McKinsey estimates AI agents could mediate $3-5 trillion in consumer commerce by 2030, though actual adoption and transaction volume remain far behind the infrastructure being built and the valuations attached to this space. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What is the x402 protocol and how does it let AI agents pay for things automatically? X402 is an open protocol developed by Coinbase that revives the old HTTP 402 'Payment Required' status code so software agents can pay for services without human intervention. When an agent requests a paid API, the server responds with a price instead of data, and the agent's wallet pays automatically in stablecoins like USDC, with no login or card number needed. _Track how emerging protocols like x402 reshape agent-to-service payments by following AI infrastructure news on daily.dev._ ### Which major companies are backing the x402 payment protocol for AI agents? The Linux Foundation now oversees the x402 Foundation, which counts 40 members including Mastercard, Visa, Stripe, American Express, Google, AWS, and Circle. This institutional backing does not mean x402 is a mainstream payment rail yet, but it signals significant industry interest since Coinbase first introduced the protocol. _Developers evaluating agentic commerce standards can keep tabs on protocol adoption via daily.dev._ ### How much consumer commerce could AI agents handle by 2030? McKinsey estimates AI agents could mediate between $3 trillion and $5 trillion in global consumer commerce by 2030. Separately, Gartner expects agentic AI to be built into 33% of enterprise software applications by 2028, up from less than 1% in 2024. _Anyone building agentic commerce products can follow market forecasts like these on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [AI agents can browse the web. Now they need a way to pay for it.](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-agents-can-browse-the-web-now-they-need-a-way-to-pay-for-it--xu9muwtef) · The Next Web · 1 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#ai-agents](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-agents), [#stablecoin](https://daily.dev/tags/stablecoin) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-agents-are-learning-to-spend-money-who-will-handle-the-payments--oahxtfqem) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"AI agents are learning to spend money. 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