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a16z (Andreessen Horowitz) · Oct 15, 2026 · 50 min

Agentic Commerce: Why Your Wallet Is About to Change

A conversation between Alex Rampell and Terry Angelos (VGS) on how agentic commerce is changing payments. They argue agents have moved from advising to acting once they hold payment credentials, setting off a 'wallet wars' among Stripe Link, Shop Pay and PayPal. They expect the market to move from walled-garden setups to open card-network agentic tokens, which keep chargebacks and merchant relationships intact. Merchants will respond differently (Amazon blocking, Walmart open, SMBs needing the channel), and liability for agent mistakes is unresolved.

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Where they stand

AI

Very bullish

Agents with payment credentials become much more useful and will unlock new commerce, with the open-standards transition and liability questions as the open issues.

Medium conviction · years

Key takeaways

  1. In the last three months agents have gone from spectators to actors because payment credentials give them 'arms and legs', which raises their utility. 12:12
  2. A 'wallet wars' has begun: Stripe Link, Shop Pay and PayPal are racing to connect to agents, competing on consumer count and merchant reach. 13:16
  3. Stripe's one-time virtual card flow is like the 'AOL' of agentic commerce: it works, but it breaks chargebacks, issuer visibility and merchant follow-on relationships. 19:52
  4. Card-network agentic tokens are the move to open standards. VGS went from zero to a few million of these tokens per week in three months and is the largest provisioner. 25:59
  5. Vaults are moving from single-player to multiplayer, which makes them more valuable. 28:09
  6. Liability for agent mistakes (the 'sound mind' question, delegated authority) is unresolved, and agents will probably have to take on some responsibility. 33:40
  7. Merchants will split: Amazon has an advertising reason to block agents, Walmart may welcome them, and Shopify SMBs need the channel. The open banking/Plaid precedent suggests a negotiated settlement. 37:32
  8. Overhyped: agents causing bank runs on savings deposits. Underhyped: unmonetized demand and savings from always-on agents. Rewards and other breakage-based models could fall apart. 40:52

Calls and positions

  • Agentic commerce will evolve from walled-garden approaches like Stripe's toward open standards built on card-network agentic tokens.
    BullishPrediction: open standards via agentic tokensTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 25:59
  • Merchants that are receptive to AI commerce will win more transactions than those that put up friction such as captchas.
    “you're going to go with the one that is receptive to AI commerce”
    BullishPredictionAlex Rampell, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 36:27
  • If agents intermediate transactions and optimise for points, card rewards ecosystems and other breakage-based models will fall apart.
    “the whole points reward ecosystem falls apart”
    BearishPrediction: rewards ecosystem falls apartTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 46:23
  • In the contest between consumer agents and merchant agents, consumers probably win in the end.
    “In the end, I think consumers probably win, but we don't know what that's going to look like”
    BullishPrediction: consumers winTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 39:12

Views expressed

  • Agents have recently shifted from passive recommenders to active transactors because they now hold payment credentials.
    “in the last 3 months we've had this huge leap from agents being what I would call spectators to agents being actors”
    Very bullishTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 12:12
  • Wallets are now racing to connect to AI agents, kicking off a 'wallet wars' among Stripe Link, Shop Pay and PayPal.
    “we sort of have kicked off what I kind of call the wallet wars where every wallet is now rushing to connect to the”
    BullishTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 13:16
  • VGS's agentic token provisioning went from zero to a few million tokens per week in about three months.
    “Now we're doing a few million of these tokens per week.”
    Very bullishTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 25:59
  • Amazon has a financial reason to block agents because its advertising business depends on human eyeballs.
    “Amazon is an advertising company and they want you and your eyeballs going to their website”
    BearishAlex Rampell, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 35:54
  • Agents will not cause bank runs on savings deposits, because friction in financial services keeps people from moving money around.
    “I don't think we're going to get a bank run on savings deposits where agents are going to sort of maximize yield”
    NeutralTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 40:52
  • Always-on agents will unlock currently unmonetized demand and add to consumer spending.
    “what's under hyped there is a lot of demand that is unmonetized”
    Very bullishTerry Angelos, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 42:01
  • Crypto's bearer-instrument nature is a drawback for commerce, since card networks' chargeback rules provide valuable trust.
    “it's kind of it's a bearer instrument. I pay with crypto, I'm never getting that back.”
    BearishAlex Rampell, Oct 15, 2026Watch at 23:09

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Summary generated by AI from the video's captionsand checked against it; quotes are verbatim. Processed Oct 25, 2026.

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