Mastercard delivers Australia’s first authenticated agentic transactions on its network, advancing its global Agent Pay program and commitment to trusted AI commerce across Asia Pacific. This latest milestone in Australia follows successful Agent Pay launches in the U.S., as well as pilots in the UAE and Latin America.
Agentic commerce – where AI-powered agents act on behalf of consumers to shop, manage subscriptions and complete everyday tasks – is poised to transform the way Australians shop online. Some research suggests that AI-powered, agentic commerce could influence more than half (55 per cent) of all Australian consumer transactions by 2030, worth up to A$670 billion in spending[1].
„Mastercard is accelerating this future by completing Australia’s first fully authenticated agentic transactions on its network and expanding the company’s global Agent Pay solution to the Asia Pacific region.” – according to the press release.
By enabling fully recognized and authenticated agentic transactions, Mastercard’s trusted agentic framework process brings AI agents into the payment flow as visible, governed participants – ensuring that every transaction is secure, transparent, and trusted.
Unlocking agentic commerce: Interoperability and standards for consumers and businesses
Mastercard’s Agent Pay framework enables seamless interoperability between issuers, acquirers and merchants. By adhering to industry standards, consumers and businesses benefit from trusted and consistent agent-powered experiences – regardless of which partners or platforms are involved.
Australia’s first Agent Pay transactions saw a Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) issued debit card used to purchase cinema tickets from Event Cinemas. The transaction was fully authorised with cardholder consent, and every participant in the payment flow – issuer, acquirer and merchant – could see and recognize that an agent conducted the transaction.
Building on this, a Westpac-issued credit card was used to book accommodation in Thredbo, demonstrating how agentic payments could support travel bookings. Both transactions were processed through IPSI and completed using Maincode’s sovereign large language model, Matilda, reinforcing the flexibility and scalability of agentic commerce across different payment environments.
“Agentic commerce represents one of the most profound shifts in consumer behavior we’ve seen in decades,” said Paul Monnington, Division President, Australasia, Mastercard. “Our role is to ensure this future is built on trust, security and transparency – the same principles Australians expect from card payments. Today’s milestone shows what’s possible when technology and governance come together.”
Accelerating agentic commerce across Australasia and beyond
Mastercard is focused on advancing agentic commerce across Australasia and Asia Pacific with additional efforts:
. Establishing a regional AI Centre of Excellence to accelerate innovation and governance for agentic commerce;
. Building deep partnerships with leading LLM providers across Asia Pacific;
. Deploying dedicated agentic commerce teams across the region to support financial institutions and merchants as they transition to agent-led experiences – including a dedicated team based at Mastercard’s Sydney Tech Hub.
Australians are already moving early. Nearly half (48 per cent) have used AI assistants to help them shop online, and 78 per cent expect these tools to become mainstream. At the same time, more than nine in ten have concerns about privacy and security, and 30 per cent say they will only use AI shopping solutions from brands they already trust[2].
Delivering transparency and trust in every agentic transaction
Transparency in agentic commerce is vital for building trust, enhancing security, and protecting all parties involved in a transaction. When AI-powered agents lead purchases, ensuring visibility throughout the payment flow allows issuers, acquirers and merchants to apply robust controls, resolve disputes efficiently and detect fraud patterns more effectively. „Mastercard Agent Pay recognizes and authenticates agents, paving the way for transparent, governed agentic commerce experiences and setting a new standard for security and reliability.” – th company said.
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[1] New minds, new markets’ report, Cognizant
[2] PayPal Australia & YouGov, “Agentic AI Set to Redefine Commerce
Banking 4.0 – „how was the experience for you”
„To be honest I think that Sinaia, your conference, is much better then Davos.”
Many more interesting quotes in the video below:
