Mastercard unveils Agent Pay for Machines protocol to enable AI agent payments

Mastercard said on Tuesday it introduced Agent Pay for Machines (AP4M), a protocol meant to let AI agents send, receive, and settle payments across its global card network, including sub-cent microtransactions. The company says more than 30 firms such as Stripe, Coinbase, and Cloudflare are early partners, with agent permissions recorded on Polygon, Solana, and Base. Executives described AP4M as a longer-term push into machine-to-machine commerce rather than a near-term revenue driver.