News

Artificial Intelligence
AI Agents Bring Shoppers, but Merchants Must Close the Sale
October 06, 2026

Watch more: The Digital Shift With Visa’s Pavan HS Artificial intelligence shopping agents are creating a new kind of customer at the merchant’s front door: software that may know what a consumer wants, yet arrives without many of the signals merchants have learned to trust....

Artificial Intelligence
Will Holiday Shopping Go Agentic? 40 Senior Execs Weigh In
October 06, 2026

AI may be ready to shop. Consumers are still deciding how much freedom they want to give it. “Holiday Retail’s AI Test Starts With Who Gets to Hit Buy” was produced by PYMNTS following a closed-door roundtable at Mastercard’s New York technology hub. The discussion brought...

B2B Payments
Karen Webster Says the Agentic Enterprise Is Already Here
October 06, 2026

October. Some readers mark it on the calendar for the return of autumn and chilly temperatures. Others get ready for the full dose of sports that comes with the NFL season and the World Series. Here at PYMNTS, it’s B2B Payments time. This year marks...

Loyalty & Rewards
Credit Union Members Want Rewards on the Tech Agenda
October 06, 2026

Credit unions deciding where to put their next technology dollar are getting a different answer from consumers than they might expect. The PYMNTS Intelligence playbook “Credit Union Innovation Readiness: The Rewards Opportunity Credit Unions Can No Longer Ignore,” produced in collaboration with Velera, found in...

Retail
Amazon’s Retail Lead Goes Beyond Electronics
October 06, 2026

Amazon now captures more spending than Walmart in five of seven retail categories, extending its reach from electronics and apparel into health and personal care. That breadth gives Amazon several ways to grow as consumers shift more purchases toward goods they can research, order and...

Artificial Intelligence
NYC Lawmakers Aim to Lead Nation in Establishing AI Safety Rules
October 05, 2026

New York City is positioning itself as a leader in an effort to slow down the development of artificial intelligence (AI), the Wall Street Journal reported Monday (Oct. 5). The New York City Council held a hearing Monday in which lawmakers heard from, and in some cases...

Retail
AI Agents Knock. Retailers Decide How Wide to Open the Door.
October 05, 2026

Retailers are drawing different lines on how far artificial intelligence (AI) shopping agents can go on their sites. Amazon blocks outside agents while it builds its own. QVC lets agents complete purchases. Walmart lets Google’s Gemini surface its products, then hands the basket to its...

Artificial Intelligence
Microsoft and Meta Steer Staff From Anthropic Claude to In-House AI
October 05, 2026

Microsoft and Meta each reduced their internal use of Anthropic’s Claude by encouraging employees to use their company’s own, in-house artificial intelligence tools, The Information reported Monday (Oct. 5), citing unnamed sources. Microsoft was on track to spend $1 billion this year on internal use...

Artificial Intelligence
Bank of America Says Investors Are Overplaying AI and Underestimating Consumers
October 05, 2026

It may be time for investors to pivot from artificial intelligence-linked capital expenditures to consumer-driven spending, Bank of America strategists wrote in a Monday (Oct. 5) note, according to a Bloomberg report. The abundance of AI spending and the shrinking of discretionary spending are already...