Mastercard partners with Ripple to launch AI‑driven Agent Pay for Machines

Mastercard has introduced “Agent Pay for Machines,” a new payment infrastructure that enables artificial‑intelligence agents to transact autonomously without human initiation. RippleX is among the first 30+ partners, providing the XRP Ledger (XRPL) and Ripple USD (RLUSD) stablecoin as the underlying technology for these machine‑speed payments.

In parallel, Ripple announced an XRPL AI Starter Kit, offering tools, documentation and integrations to help developers build agentic payment applications on the XRP Ledger. The kit highlights features such as fast settlement, predictable low costs, built‑in escrow and multi‑signature controls, and native support for multicurrency payments and a decentralized exchange. Ripple said, “As AI agents begin transacting on behalf of businesses, payments need more than speed. They need trust, controls and clear rules for how value moves.”

Both initiatives aim to standardise and scale programmable, auditable payments for AI agents across industries.