AI agents were supposed to advise shoppers, but Alchemy AgentCard is now being wired to help them pay.
Blockchain infrastructure firm Alchemy said its AI-driven identity and payment product, AgentCard, now has access to the Visa network through Visa Intelligent Commerce, according to CoinDesk. The practical claim is sharp: agents built on models from providers including OpenAI or Anthropic can make online purchases on behalf of consumers.
That moves agentic commerce from demo theater toward payment infrastructure. The agent doesn’t just recommend groceries, a vacation booking, or a subscription renewal. It can complete the transaction, using Visa-issued tokens, while preserving card rewards, credit lines, and benefits.
Alchemy AgentCard makes AI shopping less theoretical and more accountable
The old assumption was that AI agents would sit above commerce as a smart assistant layer. They would search, compare, summarize, and maybe hand the user a checkout link.
Alchemy’s pitch is different. Alchemy AgentCard gives an agent a virtual identity and spending capability, so it can act inside the commercial flow rather than merely point at it. That matters because payment access gives software real economic agency.
The immediate beneficiaries are easy to see:
- Consumers: fewer checkout steps when an agent handles routine purchases.
- Merchants: a new route to sales if agents can complete purchases through accepted rails.
- Developers: one way to connect agent behavior to identity and payment credentials.
- Card users: continued access to existing Visa-linked rewards, credit lines, and card benefits, according to Alchemy’s statement.
The hard part is also obvious. Once an AI agent can spend, identity and permissions become the product’s center of gravity. A chatbot error is annoying. A payment error costs money, triggers support work, and raises liability questions.
That separation between the AI model and the commerce layer is important. AgentCard works with agents built on models from any provider, including OpenAI or Anthropic. For readers tracking model access as a business dependency, that sits alongside XOOMAR’s coverage of Anthropic Export Controls Throw AI Access Into Chaos and SK Telecom Loses Claude Mythos as AI Access Fight Spreads.
Visa gives the agent a payment token, Alchemy gives it an identity
AgentCard is Alchemy’s identity and payment service for AI agents. It provisions what an agent needs to operate in online commerce: a Visa payment token, a dedicated email address, a phone number, and, according to Alchemy’s release, a crypto wallet through a single API.
Visa Intelligent Commerce is Visa’s framework for AI-driven commerce experiences. In this setup, AgentCard supplies the agent identity and transaction layer, while Visa supplies access to a payment network merchants already know how to process.
Alchemy says developer setup takes under a minute. Each agent receives a dedicated email address at agentcard.email and a new phone number. That matters because many online services still assume a buyer has human-style credentials for signups, confirmations, and verifications.
“Every major computing shift has produced a new kind of economic actor,” Nikil Viswanathan, co-founder and CEO of Alchemy, said in a statement. “The internet created online businesses. Mobile created the app economy. AI agents are next, and they need to be able to access the global economy, and AgentCard is how that starts.”
The product also includes spend controls. Alchemy says these include merchant category restrictions, per-transaction limits, and customizable budgets that can be set during setup or changed in real time.
The checkout flow splits the thinking model from the payment rail
The cleanest way to read the integration is this: the AI model decides what action to take, while AgentCard handles whether and how that action can be paid for.
A responsible transaction flow would need several layers. Some are described by Alchemy. Others are XOOMAR analysis based on the mechanics Alchemy disclosed.
- Permission: The user or business configures what the agent can spend and where.
- Identity: The agent uses its assigned email address and phone number where services require credentials.
- Payment: The transaction defaults to tokenized card payments using Visa-issued tokens.
- Routing: AgentCard’s routing layer selects the available payment mechanism.
- Fallback: Where agent-native payment protocols are not supported, AgentCard falls back to single-use tokens.
Alchemy says the routing layer is designed to select the best available payment rail for each transaction and automatically upgrade the payment path as merchant and network adoption grows, without requiring reconfiguration.
That design avoids locking the agent to one AI model provider. A developer could build the reasoning layer on OpenAI or Anthropic, while the payment execution still runs through AgentCard and Visa Intelligent Commerce.
| Commerce step | Before agentic payments | With Alchemy AgentCard and Visa |
|---|---|---|
| Product decision | User compares and chooses manually | Agent can identify and select options |
| Checkout | User enters or confirms payment | Agent can transact with a Visa-issued token |
| Identity | Human email and phone dominate | Agent gets its own email and phone number |
| Controls | Cardholder behavior is the main control point | Budgets, merchant categories, and transaction limits can be configured |
A work-trip booking shows where convenience ends and control has to start
Take the travel example Alchemy itself gives: an agent can book a vacation. A business version is easy to imagine, but this is scenario analysis, not a reported product workflow.
A user asks an AI agent to book a last-minute work trip. The user has a preferred airline, a hotel range, and company rules. The agent searches options, filters what fits the constraints, and prepares purchases. If the agent is provisioned through Alchemy AgentCard, it has the identity credentials needed for accounts and verifications, plus a payment token for checkout.
The strongest version of this flow is not “set it loose and hope.” It is controlled delegation. The user sets limits. The agent operates inside them. For purchases outside those limits, the product should require extra confirmation.
Alchemy’s disclosed controls point in that direction: merchant category restrictions, per-transaction limits, and customizable budgets. The source material does not say how refunds, itinerary changes, or policy exceptions are handled. Those details will matter for enterprises more than the booking demo itself.
Visa-enabled agents raise the cost of AI mistakes
Giving AI agents Visa-enabled payment power changes the risk profile. The source material does not report fraud events or liability terms, so the following is analysis rather than a claim about Alchemy’s live performance.
The risk categories are clear:
- Unauthorized spending: An agent buys outside the user’s intent or configured limits.
- Bad interpretation: The model misunderstands a request and completes the wrong transaction.
- Fake merchants: An agent may encounter malicious storefronts or misleading offers.
- Account misuse: Agent credentials become another surface for takeover attempts.
- Refund friction: Reversing a bad autonomous purchase may be harder than stopping one before checkout.
Visa’s Tanner Riche framed the need in identity and trust terms.
“As AI agents take on a more active role in commerce, they need to demonstrate trusted identity and seamless ways to transact,” said Tanner Riche, VP, Growth Products and Partnerships, Visa.
The accountability question remains the hardest one: if an AI agent makes the wrong purchase, who eats the loss? The user, developer, merchant, card issuer, network, or payment product provider? The supplied material does not answer that. Spend controls reduce the blast radius, but they don’t settle liability.
Payment access turns agentic commerce into an infrastructure race
Alchemy’s Visa access shows why agentic commerce won’t scale on clever chat alone. It needs identity, spending limits, tokenized payment credentials, and rails merchants can already accept.
That makes Alchemy AgentCard more than a feature for AI assistants. It is an infrastructure bet. The company is trying to sit between model providers, payment networks, crypto wallets, and merchants as the layer that lets agents operate.
Developers and enterprises should now watch the unglamorous details: API reliability, supported geographies, compliance requirements, fees, fraud controls, refund handling, and how much visibility users get before and after an agent spends.
The near-term test is not whether an AI agent can buy groceries once. It is whether consumers and businesses trust it to spend repeatedly, within clear limits, with records and controls strong enough for real commerce.
Disclaimer: This XOOMAR analysis is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not financial, investment, legal, tax, or professional advice. It does not provide buy, sell, hold, price-target, portfolio, or personalized recommendations. Verify information independently and consult qualified professionals before making decisions.
The Bottom Line
- AgentCard moves AI agents closer to real payment infrastructure rather than just shopping recommendations.
- Visa network access could make agent-led purchases more practical for consumers, merchants, and developers.
- Letting AI agents spend money raises new stakes around identity, permissions, and transaction control.
Originally published on XOOMAR. For more news and analysis, visit XOOMAR.
