x402 Foundation Launches Open Standard for AI Agent Payments

The Linux Foundation announced the launch of the x402 Foundation on July 14, 2026, creating an open‑governance body to manage the x402 protocol – an HTTP‑based standard that embeds secure, native payment capabilities into web interactions. The protocol is intended to let AI agents, APIs and applications conduct financial transactions without human authentication steps such as credit‑card forms or invoice approvals.

Forty founding members spanning the payments ecosystem joined the new foundation, including Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Stripe, Adyen, Fiserv, Google, AWS, Circle, Coinbase, the Solana Foundation, Stellar Development Foundation and Ripple. Their participation reflects a shared belief that the internet’s economic architecture must evolve before autonomous AI agents can function as full economic participants.