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MasterCard has opened early access to Agent Pay, for, and Machines. This is a system that allows AI proxies to discover services, agree to terms, and make payments within manually set expenditure limits; the company also demonstrated a real-time transaction on Cloudflare Connect.

The system is built on the x402 protocol. When a proxy encounters a "402 Payment Required" response, it generates a signed "payment voucher." Under this mechanism, the proxy creates a digitally signed voucher as a security commitment to make payments within the approved limit, and the service provider delivers the service after verification.

MasterCard stated that this system reflects the company's vision of advancing AI agents from a “concept” to something that can be actually traded. The company initially announced this plan in June and disclosed this progress on the same day at the Connect conference in Cloudflare. MasterCard also demonstrated a real-time transaction on-site during their Jorn Lambert.

This concept is aimed at solving the problems that arise as the capabilities of AI agents enhance: they are becoming "economic entities" that need to purchase data from one supplier, AI models from another, and computing power from a third party. However, current paid services typically require the establishment of separate accounts, API keys, or billing relationships for each service, which becomes ineffective when agents need to temporarily select different services.

Based on the open protocol x402, this system allows online services to request payments and integrates them with the Mastercard network. The process relies on authorization rather than the payment itself.

The enterprise first assigns tasks and expenditure limits to agents; when an agent encounters a charging service and receives a "402 Payment Required" response, it generates a digitally signed certificate as a security commitment to make payments within the approved limit. The service provider provides the service after verification. The entire interaction is completed off-chain at machine speed, and the service provider can aggregate the certificates in batches before making unified settlements.

In the demonstration, an agent from a marketing agency named Hype planned a protein bar advertising campaign within a set budget. They first identified the registered service providers and then executed a two-step plan: one part involved social media research from a supplier, and the other part involved generating campaign images through Cloudflare. The entire process involved making 9 payments to two separate vendors, without the need for separate accounts or invoices.

In the backend, the developer platform of Coinbase provides wallets, the Ethereum second-layer network Base offers on-chain settlement, while BVNK, a stablecoin company acquired by Mastercard in August, is responsible for payments and settlements in fiat currency or stablecoins through Mastercard's Global Money Platform.

This release follows closely on the end-to-end pilots conducted by MasterCard with Cloudflare, Ant International, AWS, BVNK, and Coinbase. The company has also introduced API on both the buyer and seller sides, as well as a toolkit and a sandbox environment for developers.

This also marks a significant milestone in MasterCard's recent rapid advancement of stablecoins and AI agency services. The company has just launched the Stablecoin Security risk management tool, as well as the Global Money Platform supported by BVNK.