Thredd and Visa Enable AI-Powered Card Payments for EU

Artificial intelligence-focused issuer-processing platform Thredd joined the Visa Agentic Ready program, according to a Wednesday (July 15) press release.

Thredd’s participation will enable European financial institutions to process AI-initiated transactions without replacing their existing payment infrastructures, the release said. The integration’s rollout will include consumer payments platform Zilch, which will be among the first issuers on the Thredd platform to activate these capabilities for its cardholders.

As the market transitions toward agentic commerce, where AI software independently locates products and executes purchases, Thredd aims to position itself at the “trust layer” of the payments ecosystem, according to the release.

Under this model, trust verification adapts to new technologies. For example, a customer can instruct an AI agent to find an item within a set budget. After a single biometric confirmation via a Visa Payment Passkey, the agent finalizes the purchase directly on the user’s behalf, the release said.

To facilitate this, Thredd relies on established infrastructure like the Visa Token Service, ensuring that AI agents interact only with secure tokens instead of underlying card credentials, according to the release. It further builds on this infrastructure with specialized tokens and custom fraud rules designed to catch AI-specific anomalies, such as deviation from a user’s set parameters.

“Agentic commerce represents a fundamental shift in how payments will work, and getting the infrastructure right from the outset is critical,” Zilch CEO Philip Belamant said in the release. “Through the partnership], we’re ensuring that as AI agents become a natural part of how our customers shop and spend, the trust, security and control that defines the Zilch experience remains intact.”

Similarly, Thredd CEO Jim McCarthy emphasized the importance of delivering a seamless transition for financial institutions.

“Every major shift in payments requires a trusted layer that can turn ecosystem complexity into scalable capability,” McCarthy said in the release.

Through its participation in the program, “Thredd is providing that bridge, enabling issuers across Europe to become agent-ready through the platform they already trust,” McCarthy added.

Meanwhile, AI is transforming credit and payments from static, origination-based products into dynamic, transaction-level features. The market is shifting toward “agentic credit,” using real-time transaction intelligence embedded directly into the payment flow.

Thredd Chief Product Officer Ryan Dew told PYMNTS in May that the new frontier of innovation lies squarely at the point of transaction, where richer, contextual data allows AI systems to make continuous, rapid decisions. As consumers increasingly expect automated and personalized financial experiences, platforms equipped to securely execute programmable payments are positioned to lead the next wave of global commerce.

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