Google on Wednesday announced the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), an open standard designed for AI agents to conduct secure and verifiable payments.
The protocol, developed with more than 60 payments and technology companies, extends Google’s existing Agent2Agent (A2A) and Model Context Protocol (MCP) frameworks.
Stavan Parikh, vice president and general manager of payments at Google, said the rise of autonomous agents requires a new foundation for trust. He added that AP2 establishes the foundation for authorization, authenticity, and accountability in agent-led transactions.
“AP2 provides a trusted foundation to fuel a new era of AI-driven commerce. It establishes the core building blocks for secure transactions, creating clear opportunities for the industry–including networks, issuers, merchants, technology providers, and end users–to innovate on adjacent areas like seamless agent authorization and decentralized identity,” Parikh said.
Unlike traditional payment systems that assume a human directly initiates a purchase, AP2 addresses the challenges of proving intent and authority when an AI acts on a user’s behalf. The framework uses cryptographically signed digital contracts called Mandates to serve as verifiable proof of a user’s instructions. These can cover both real-time transactions, where a customer is present, and delegated tasks, such as buying concert tickets automatically under pre-approved conditions.
Rao Surapaneni, vice president and general manager of business applications platform at Google Cloud, said the protocol provides secure, compliant transactions between agents and merchants while supporting multiple payment types, from cards to stablecoins.
Google said AP2 will also support cryptocurrency payments through an extension called A2A x402, developed in partnership with Coinbase, Ethereum Foundation and MetaMask. This allows agents to handle stablecoin payments within the same framework.
Industry players expressed support for the initiative. Luke Gebb, executive vice president of Amex Digital Labs, said the rise of AI commerce makes trust and accountability more important than ever, and AP2 is intended to protect customers.
Coinbase head of engineering Erik Reppel said the inclusion of x402 showed that agent-to-agent payments aren’t just an experiment anymore and are becoming part of how developers actually build.
Adyen co-chief executive Ingo Uytdehaage said the protocol creates a “common rulebook” to ensure security and interoperability across the payments ecosystem.
Backers include Mastercard, PayPal, Revolut, Salesforce, Worldpay, Accenture, Adobe, Deloitte and Dell, who said the framework could open up opportunities for secure agent-driven commerce ranging from consumer shopping to enterprise procurement.
Google has published the technical specifications and reference implementations in a public GitHub repository and invited the wider payments and technology community to contribute to its development.
The post Google Launches Agent Payments Protocol to Standardise AI Transactions appeared first on Analytics India Magazine.
