Mastercard Launches AP4M for AI Agent Payments

Mastercard has launched Agent Pay for Machines (AP4M), a payments service designed to enable high-volume, low-value transactions between AI agents and machines. The system supports payments across cards, bank accounts, and stablecoins and adds credentialing, permissioning, and programmatic spending controls.

The AP4M network includes more than 30 industry partners, including Adyen, Stripe, Coinbase, Cloudflare, OKX, and Checkout.com, as early supporters. Mastercard is recording agent permissions on blockchains such as Polygon, Solana, and Base.

Jorn Lambert, Mastercard's chief product officer, said the service will 'create the conditions for a superbloom of AI business models.'