Mastercard opens early access to AI agent payments, with Coinbase among pilot participants

October 21 — According to The Block, Mastercard has opened early access to its machine-to-machine payment system, Agent Pay for Machines, allowing developers to use the first buyer and seller APIs, developer toolkit, and sandbox environment. The product is still in the pilot stage and has not yet been commercialized. Mastercard has previously completed end-to-end pilots with Cloudflare, Ant International, BVNK, AIsa, Base, and Coinbase. In a demonstration at the Cloudflare Connect conference, an AI agent paid a service provider through Coinbase's x402 protocol, using Base as the on-chain settlement network. The system was first announced in June this year and supports card, bank account, and stablecoin payments.