{"id":1025,"date":"2026-10-29T11:37:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T16:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.paymentconsulting.net\/Blog\/wordpress\/?p=1025"},"modified":"2026-10-29T11:37:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T16:37:12","slug":"mastercards-plans-for-a-turning-point-in-agentic-commerce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.paymentconsulting.net\/Blog\/wordpress\/?p=1025","title":{"rendered":"Mastercard\u2019s Plans for a \u2018Turning Point\u2019 in Agentic Commerce"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/i>John Stewart<\/a><\/span> <\/i>October 29, 2026<\/span> <\/i>Competitive Strategies<\/a>, Credit Cards<\/a>, Debit Cards<\/a>, Digital Currency<\/a>, E-Commerce<\/a>, Mobile Commerce<\/a>, Point-of-sale<\/a>, Transaction Processing<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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One of the biggest trends in payments these days is agentic commerce, and the major card networks are making sure they can master the trend on behalf of banks and merchants. The payoff can be substantial. \u201cAI is changing how commerce happens, and that leads to more transactions for Mastercard,\u201d noted Michael Miebach, Mastercard\u2019s chief executive, early Thursday. And now, \u201cwe expect that trend to build\u201d as the holidays arrive, he added during a group call to discuss the network\u2019s September-quarter results.<\/p>\n

With momentum building this year, payments networks can\u2019t afford to fall behind on agentic commerce<\/a><\/strong>, Miebach said. Yet Mastercard, as a network, must cater to a wide range of banks, processors, sellers, and other payments players, which introduces complications, given varying stages of readiness in the industry, Miebach told equity analysts on the call.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of patchwork going on here, not everybody\u2019s ready at the same time,\u201d he said. \u201cMerchants need to be discoverable, and not all merchants are ready. So we\u2019re kind of ready to take off. If we get this right it will truly be the next turning point in digital commerce.\u201d Mastercard launched Agent Suite in January, and added Agent Connect late this summer to help merchants with agentic commerce.<\/p>\n

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For merchants, discoverability will depend on both readiness and technical understanding, Miebach added. And right now, \u201cthere is a wide, wide spectrum as to where merchants are\u201d on agentic commerce, he noted. \u201cBut we believe it will take off.\u201d The fuel for that takeoff, he argued, will come from third-party payment-service providers. These independent players \u201care going to be absolutely critical on that\u201d as they equip merchants with understanding on top of technology.<\/p>\n

With agentic commerce, shoppers can assign software agents, or bits of code, to crawl the Web in search of products the shoppers want to buy. Controversy has arisen in recent months over the question of whether AI agents should be enabled to buy the products once they\u2019re found or simply be restricted to discovery.<\/p>\n

What networks like Mastercard can\u2019t afford is a state of unreadiness among agents at the network level, Miebach warned. These days, \u201cAI is unfortunately in the hands of fraudsters, so now [Mastercard] is in cybersecurity<\/a><\/strong> in a major way,\u201d he said, adding that readiness was the goal behind Mastercard\u2019s move to acquire Recorded Future<\/a><\/strong>, a provider of risk intelligence, last year for $2.65 billion.<\/p>\n

Another business Mastercard has pursued recently is stablecoins<\/a><\/strong>, digital money that reflects a steady value backed by fiat money such as the U.S. dollar. A major move on that front was Mastercard\u2019s $1.8 billion deal for BVNK<\/a><\/strong>, a stablecoin-technology platform that does business in more than 130 countries. The deal closed in August.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re very happy [that deal] closed,\u201d Miebach said. \u201cIt has been strong out of the gate. It\u2019s a very different mindset coming into Mastercard.\u201d\u00a0 Perhaps more important is that BVNK \u201cis a revenue-generating business,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

For the quarter, Mastercard posted $9.81 billion in net revenue, up 14% year-over-year, while net income rose 17% to $4.65 billion. That result arrived on a 7% rise in global gross dollar volume, to $2.95 trillion, while U.S. volume grew 6% to $867 million. Mastercard and Maestro cards outstanding totaled 3.8 billion for the quarter, up 5% from a year ago<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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