Mastercard Says Cards Will Power Agentic Commerce

While Mastercard reported another quarter of double-digit revenue growth Thursday (July 30), executives devoted much of their second-quarter earnings discussion to explaining why agentic artificial intelligence could strengthen the economics of the card network.

AI may change where commerce begins, but Mastercard said it won’t change what makes payments work.

Mastercard CEO Michael Miebach said during the Thursday conference call that Mastercard views agentic commerce as “the next evolution in payments,” and within that evolution, the company expects its Agent Pay platform to extend existing network capabilities into AI-driven shopping.

Miebach drew a distinction between AI deciding what to buy and the infrastructure needed to complete the purchase. Merchants still need broad acceptance, predictable payment experiences and protections, while consumers need a way to challenge purchases made by autonomous software.

“We really believe that cards will prevail in that world,” Miebach said. “The card infrastructure, the card ecosystem, and the Mastercard proposition within that is unique.”

One reason is a capability Mastercard calls Verifiable Intent, developed with Google as part of Agent Pay, he said.

“Verifiable intent allows you to basically challenge a transaction and say, ‘I never wanted to buy this,’” Miebach said, adding that existing chargeback processes can then resolve disputes involving AI-assisted purchases.

AI could create entirely new payment categories, Miebach said. Consumer purchases can continue to flow over existing card infrastructure. Machine-to-machine transactions, however, could require different settlement mechanisms because AI systems may buy data, APIs and computing services at high speed and very low values.

“There could be an entirely new range of transactions,” he said, pointing to Mastercard’s Agent Pay for Machines initiative, which supports those interactions while allowing settlement over multiple types of rails.

Meanwhile, rather than presenting digital assets as a replacement for traditional payments, Miebach described stablecoins as another settlement option that still requires a trusted network.

“Stablecoins are not the answer to everything,” Miebach said.

Consumers and businesses still need acceptance, protections and interoperability across different coins and blockchains, which is why Mastercard continues investing in initiatives such as Open USD and its pending acquisition of BVNK.

The discussion came against a backdrop of healthy operating results.

Chief Financial Officer Sachin Mehra said currency-neutral net revenue increased 12% during the quarter, while adjusted net income rose 16%. Value-Added Services and Solutions revenue climbed 18%, worldwide gross dollar volume increased 8%, and cross-border volume grew 12%. Contactless represented 80% of in-person switched purchase transactions globally, while tokenized transactions exceeded 40% of all switched transactions.

Mehra also said underlying spending trends remained steady after the quarter ended.

Switch metrics were generally in line with Q1, and underlying spend remained stable, Mehra said, adding that the first four weeks of July remained “relatively stable and strong.” Excluding the Capital One debit portfolio migration, U.S. switch volume growth accelerated sequentially as fuel spending strengthened and both consumer and business spending continued to perform well. Cross-border growth also benefited from improving travel trends and increased card-not-present spending originating from Venezuela.

Asked whether U.S. spending strength was concentrated among affluent households, Mehra said it remained broad-based.

“We see it across credit and debit; we see it across consumer and commercial,” he said.

While affluent spending continues to grow somewhat faster, Mastercard continues to see healthy demand across both mass-market and affluent consumers, Mehra added.

Cybersecurity also was part of the larger discussion during the earnings call. Miebach said AI is increasing demand for fraud prevention, identity and cyber services, making security a larger part of Mastercard’s growth strategy alongside payments. The company said its Threat Intelligence platform has identified more than 7 million card-testing attacks across 192 countries, preventing an estimated $172 million in fraud, while acquisitions such as Recorded Future are expanding those capabilities beyond traditional card transactions.

Shares were up 2.4% early Thursday afternoon.

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