The agentic commerce wave

Welcome to Inside the Circles, your scoop on the people, tech and trends shaping the digital economy and beyond. 

Someday soon, your personal AI-powered robot could go to the local pharmacy, fill your prescription and negotiate special offers with the pharmacy’s own AI agent. 

Mastercard asked four futurists to imagine what AI-infused commerce could eventually look like. Their ideas touched on machine-speed decision making, cyber and trust risks, agents engaging with other agents engaging with even more agents and, yes, physical AI representatives.  

All these ideas were bundled into a (perhaps surprisingly) very human report called “A Short History of the Future of Shopping and Payments.” 

The report was part of Mastercard’s series of stories, announcements and events throughout this month that focused on AI, its implications and its promise. Check out a bunch of those pieces here: 

• During RiskX, Mastercard’s flagship cyber and security conference, Ann Johnson , who leads the Security Solutions business, today unveiled new agentic trust and intelligence capabilities as part of Mastercard’s existing Agent Pay agentic commerce platform. These new services form the intelligence layer of Mastercard's Agent Pay Trust Framework, which outlines the principles needed to bring security, accountability and transparency to agent-driven interactions. 
• Mastercard hosted a handful of AI-themed events throughout the month, including a roundtable with PYMNTS on the future of agentic commerce as well as the Digital Ambassadors Forum and Data for Inclusive Growth Forum during the U.N. General Assembly. Shamina Singh , founder and president of the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth , said during the data summit: “It’s better to lead and build with our values from the beginning rather than try to retrofit a solution that may be too little, too late. This is our moment.” 
• Mastercard partnered with startup Alchemy to allow AI agents to complete payments for users. See the LinkedIn roundup and Wall Street Journal coverage.
• Oracle 's Christopher Adams talked about the power of AI to transform commercial payments in this Mastercard Newsroom Q&A. 
• Many small businesses are crazy busy, and they think AI can help. In this trend story, entrepreneurs and experts share their expectations for how AI could change the game for mom-and-pop shops. 
• Mastercard Start Path, the company’s startup engagement program, invited 22 new agentic commerce startups as part of its inaugural Agentic Commerce & Services cohort. Meet six of the founders and CEOs and read their takes on the rise of the shopping robot here. 
• Ever heard of a large tabular model? Well, if not, here’s an explainer with everything you need to know. 
• The Mastercard Business Intelligence team writes about how agentic commerce is influencing the way people make payment and card choices. 

Holiday forecast: Cloudy with a good chance of spend 

Despite plenty of headwinds, consumer spending is expected to stay strong through the holidays. 

According to the Mastercard Economics Institute’s latest SpendingPulse holiday forecast, U.S. retail spending is expected to rise by 5.5% from last year, with about half that increase stemming from inflation. The latest report also noted that spending on electronics and the experience economy — including travel, restaurants and live shows — should be especially strong. 

“Consumers have purchasing power and they are absolutely putting it to work,” Michelle Meyer , Mastercard’s chief economist, said about the new forecast on CNBC last week, attributing that strength to higher wages and broad-based jobs growth. 

Watch out

What happens when Mastercard teams up with McLaren Racing to see if the payments company can send funds overseas as quickly as McLaren’s 1.8 second pitstop time? Watch this video to find out. 🏎️ 

Plus, you can learn more about cross-border payments in the new “Money in Motion” report. 

ICYMI

Loyalty matters: A new e-book from Mastercard and Datos Insights talks about the banking app features consumers are looking for — like subscription management and personalized offers — and could cause them to jump to a new bank. 

Trading places: Commerce is increasingly global; the rules governing it are not. In a new op-ed with Fortune , Jon Huntsman Jr., vice chairman and president of Strategic Growth at Mastercard, talks about how that's changing thanks to efforts like the Digital Economy Framework Agreement, or DEFA, in Asia. Want to learn more about how the digital economy is changing in that region? Check out news and updates here from the ASEAN Inclusive Growth Summit, coming up in Manila on Nov. 11. 

SoFi, so good: SoFi this month announced that it started settling debit and credit card transactions using its stablecoin, SoFiUSD, on Mastercard’s network, making it the first national bank to do so. The change means that " any merchant can receive settlement funds instantly in a SoFi Bank account and withdraw to cash around the clock and at zero cost,” according to a press release. Read coverage from The Block and PYMNTS.