Payments technology company Clink added support for Mastercard Agent Pay on November 9, alongside its existing Visa Intelligent Commerce capabilities, PYMNTS reported. The move follows an October Visa initiative with BILL and Billtrust that let authenticated AI agents complete previously approved invoice payments through supplier portals.
PYMNTS describes Mastercard Agent Pay and Visa's program as similar: both combine tokenized credentials, authentication and transaction controls for payments that AI agents initiate. The outlet argues the networks are competing to own the rules for who authenticates an agent and sets its spending authority, not just transaction volume. For now, it says, the networks are focused on executing payment decisions a business has already made rather than letting agents decide.
PYMNTS also says banks could stay relevant by embedding credit, liquidity and funding into automated workflows, and that liability for a wrong payment by an authorized agent is the unresolved question. Tungsten Automation Head of Payments and Embedded Finance Andrew Ng told the outlet that "payment execution alone is increasingly commoditized." A PYMNTS Intelligence report from September 2025 found nearly 7% of U.S. enterprise CFOs had deployed agentic AI in live finance workflows, with another 5% piloting.
