The emerging infrastructure that enables autonomous AI agents to discover, evaluate, and purchase digital services programmatically.
AI agents are getting really good at completing complex workflows across the internet, but the infrastructure that lets them buy services autonomously is only beginning to take shape.
Agentic commerce is the emerging infrastructure that lets agents discover tools, pay for digital services, and execute transactions autonomously. Protocols such as MCP, ACP, x402, UCP, L402, and MPP are early attempts to build this infrastructure. They're the foundation of what may become an agentic economy.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP) | An open standard for programmatic commerce flows between buyers, AI agents, businesses, and payment providers, co-developed by Stripe and OpenAI. |
| Agentic Commerce | Infrastructure that lets AI agents discover, evaluate, and buy services autonomously instead of humans using websites or APIs manually. |
| Agentic Commerce Stack | The layered infrastructure behind agent transactions, including tool connectivity (MCP), identity and trust (KYA, ERC-8004), authorization, payments (ACP, x402, UCP, L402), and observability. |
| Agentic Economy | A digital economy where autonomous AI agents participate in economic activity such as finding services, buying resources, and coordinating work. |
| Agentic Payments | Payment systems designed for AI agents, allowing software to pay programmatically for APIs, datasets, compute, or automation tools. |
| Agent-to-Agent (A2A) | Transactions that occur directly between autonomous AI agents, such as one agent paying another for specialized tasks. |
| AI Agent | Software capable of pursuing goals autonomously by reasoning, using tools, and executing actions, often combining LLMs with APIs and external tools. |
| Business-to-Agent (B2A) | Commerce where businesses sell services directly to AI agents, such as API access, datasets, automation services, or compute. |
| ERC-8004 | An Ethereum standard for agent identity and trust with Identity, Reputation, and Validation registries for cross-organization agent discovery. |
| Know Your Agent (KYA) | Identity and trust infrastructure for autonomous agents, similar to KYC for humans, used to verify agents and establish trust. |
| L402 | A protocol combining HTTP 402 with Bitcoin Lightning Network payments to gate API access. Settles over Lightning rather than stablecoins. |
| Machine Payments Protocol (MPP) | An open-source standard for machine-native payments co-authored by Stripe and Tempo, launched March 2026. |
| Model Context Protocol (MCP) | Open standard from Anthropic for connecting AI agents to external tools and services via a standardized interface. |
| Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) | An open standard for commerce developed by Shopify that enables AI agents to interact with merchant storefronts in a standardized way. |
| Visa Trusted Agent Protocol | A framework developed by Visa that lets AI agents authenticate and transact on trusted networks. |
Anthropic's open standard for connecting AI agents to external tools and services. Provides a unified interface for tool discovery and invocation.
Co-developed by Stripe and OpenAI. Enables programmatic commerce flows between buyers, AI agents, businesses, and payment providers.
Developed by Shopify. Standardizes how AI agents interact with merchant storefronts and e-commerce platforms.
HTTP 402-based payment protocols. L402 uses Bitcoin Lightning Network; x402 uses stablecoins on traditional blockchains.
Co-authored by Stripe and Tempo (March 2026). Defines how agents and services coordinate payments programmatically.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Agentic Commerce | Infrastructure that lets AI agents discover, evaluate, and buy services autonomously instead of humans using websites or APIs manually. |
| Agentic Economy | A digital economy where autonomous AI agents participate in economic activity such as finding services, buying resources, and coordinating work. |
| Agentic Payments | Payment systems designed for AI agents, allowing software to pay programmatically for APIs, datasets, compute, or automation tools. |
| Agent-to-Agent (A2A) | Transactions that occur directly between autonomous AI agents, such as one agent paying another for specialized tasks. |
| Business-to-Agent (B2A) | Commerce where businesses sell services directly to AI agents, such as API access, datasets, automation services, or compute. |
| Know Your Agent (KYA) | Identity and trust infrastructure for autonomous agents, similar to KYC for humans, used to verify agents and establish trust. |
| ERC-8004 | Ethereum standard for agent identity and trust with Identity, Reputation, and Validation registries for cross-organization agent discovery. |
| Agentic Commerce Stack | The layered infrastructure behind agent transactions, including tool connectivity, identity and trust, authorization, payments, and observability. |
# Agent requests API access
GET /api/data
HTTP/1.1 402 Payment Required
WWW-Authenticate: x402 realm="Data API",
invoice="lnbc10u1p3...",
macaroon="AgEDbG5..."
# Agent pays via stablecoin
POST /api/payment
{
"payment_proof": "0x1234...",
"invoice": "lnbc10u1p3..."
}
# Access granted
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
{
"data": {...},
"access_token": "eyJhbGciOiJ..."
}