Agentic Commerce: Trust, Tokens and ‘Know Your Agent’ for the AI Economy

Abstract

The panel explored how autonomous AI agents are beginning to reshape digital commerce. The discussion moved from fundamental challenges—capturing tacit consumer preferences and building trustworthy agent identities—to concrete merchant traction, token‑based payment flows, and the governance scaffolding required for large‑scale adoption. Participants highlighted early‑stage successes (e.g., a personal 401(k) filing via an agent), the dramatic uplift in conversion rates when agents mediate purchases, and the need for cryptographic identities, granular authorisation, provenance, and dispute‑resolution mechanisms. The conversation closed with reflections on inclusion, bias, biometrics, and cybersecurity risks, underscoring both the promise and the perils of an AI‑driven commerce economy.

Detailed Summary

Key Insight – Consumer preferences are often tacit—they exist in the mind but are not yet captured in structured data.

The panel opened with a discussion of the gap between what users like and what can be expressed in a data set.
[Speaker uncertain – likely Dr Jalote] explained that despite the abundance of loyalty‑program and transaction logs, much of the nuanced decision‑making remains uncaptured, limiting agents’ ability to act autonomously.
The panel agreed that while today we “know a lot” about consumer behaviour (every phone touch, click‑through, or browse), we still need richer signals to bridge the tacit‑knowledge gap.

Recommendation – Invest in mechanisms (e.g., consent‑driven preference capture, fine‑grained interaction logs) that can translate tacit intent into machine‑readable formats.

2. A Real‑World Agentic Transaction (Personal Anecdote)

Speaker – [Speaker uncertain] (likely an audience participant or one of the panelists) recounted a personal experience:

On Dec 29, the speaker realised they had not yet funded their 401(k) for the year.
A Fidelity custodian instructed the speaker to use an AI agent to submit the contribution.
The agent requested consent three times, confirming the exact amount, source account, and destination, then executed the transfer, saving the speaker a trip to the bank.
After the transaction the agent was de‑instantiated, leaving no lingering credentials.

Takeaway – Trust is built when agents operate transparently, request explicit consent, and have a well‑defined lifecycle (create → execute → destroy).

3. Merchant Traction – “Agents Requested by the Market”

Speaker – Dr Prakhar Mehrotra (PayPal) (supported by Janet George, Mastercard)

Merchant demand is flipping the traditional technology‑supply model: merchants are now asking for agents to embed on their sites.
Example: Fidelity wants an on‑site agent to guide retirement‑plan contributions.
The panel highlighted the creation of unstructured conversational data (natural‑language interactions) as a fresh asset class for merchants—unlike historic click‑stream data.

Key Data Point – Early pilots show a 7–9× increase in conversion when an agent mediates the purchase journey, because agents reduce indecision by iteratively refining recommendations.

Implication – Agents can become a front‑end for intent capture, turning vague consumer desires into actionable signals for inventory, supply‑chain, and marketing teams.

4. Trust, Identity, and Authorization

Speaker – Janet George (Mastercard) (joined by Prag Sharma, Citi)

Three pillars of trustworthy agents were identified:
1. Cryptographic Identity – Each agent must possess a verifiable, non‑repudiable identity (e.g., X.509 certificates, decentralized identifiers).
2. Granular Authorization – Permissions must be dynamic and task‑specific (e.g., read‑email vs. send‑email scopes), enforced via emerging standards (SPIFFE, OAuth‑style delegations).
3. Provenance / Chain‑of‑Custody – A tamper‑evident ledger (blockchain or similar) should record the full lifecycle of an agent’s actions, enabling auditability.
Redress mechanisms – Mastercard’s existing dispute‑resolution framework serves as a model: agents must inherit the same consumer‑protection guarantees as human‑initiated transactions.

Recommendation – Adopt a layered accountability model: identity → authorization → provenance → redress, enforced consistently across all participating ecosystems.

5. Governance and the Role of “Frictions”

Speaker – Mr Arvind Jayaprakash (Glance)

While automation reduces friction, deliberate friction (e.g., a final human confirmation for high‑stakes actions) is essential to avoid “silent” consumer harm.
The panel argued that governance should be encoded as a design principle, not an after‑thought: mandatory user‑in‑the‑loop checkpoints for a small percentage of high‑risk transactions.

Takeaway – Governance is most effective when it preserves user agency while still leveraging agent efficiency.

6. Memory Management & Agent Lifecycle

Speaker – [Speaker uncertain] (likely Dr Jalote)

Agents possess working, short‑term, long‑term, and episodic memory (the latter recently introduced by Amazon).
Proper memory flushing and de‑instantiation are non‑negotiable to prevent data leakage and model drift.

Best Practice – Implement explicit memory‑expiry policies and sandboxed storage for each agent instance.

7. Tokenisation – The Financial “Glue”

Speaker – Prag Sharma (Citi)

Tokens are digital representations that provide traceability and identity for assets (e.g., stable‑coins for fiat, smart‑contract‑backed vouchers).
Tokens enable programmable enforcement of Service Level Agreements (SLAs): e.g., “Pay X only if delivery occurs before 6 pm; otherwise, pay Y.”
Tokens can be issued as short‑lived, purpose‑bound credentials that agents consume without ever handling raw credentials.

Insight – Tokenisation decouples payment from identity, allowing agents to transact securely even across heterogeneous payment rails (traditional ACH, card networks, or blockchain).

8. Inclusion, Rural Merchants, and Small‑Business Benefits

Speaker – Mr Arvind Jayaprakash

For agents to deliver inclusive growth, they must be accessible to low‑tech merchants (e.g., via lightweight SDKs, offline‑first designs).
Rural users can benefit from agents that aggregate demand, reducing transaction costs and enabling micro‑credit mechanisms.

Recommendation – Foster public‑private partnerships to subsidise agent deployment in underserved regions, and design localized language models.

9. Bias, Echo‑Chambers, and Market Concentration

Speaker – Audience member (Shashud, AI‑founder)

Concern: agents trained on majority‑user data may reinforce existing demand patterns, marginalising niche products.
Counter‑point: algorithms can be explicitly tuned to surface under‑represented items if the objective function includes diversity metrics.

Conclusion – Bias mitigation requires intentional data collection and fairness‑aware recommendation policies.

10. Discovery & Micro‑Transactions for AI‑Generated Services

Speaker – Audience member (Founder, Karada.ai)

Question about micro‑payment mechanisms for “Micro‑Creator‑Products (MCPs)” that agents expose (e.g., PDF‑to‑JPG conversion).
Panel response: Agent‑to‑agent payment protocols (token‑based, lightweight) are under active development; expect viable standards within six months.

Implication – A standardised micropayment layer will accelerate the ecosystem of AI‑generated utilities.

11. Biometrics as an Identity Lever

Speaker – Audience member (Piyush)

Biometrics can provide stronger assurance for agent‑initiated payments, but agents themselves lack a “human” biometric substrate.
Suggested approach: bind biometric proofs to token issuance (e.g., a one‑time biometric attestation that mints a short‑lived payment token).

12. Dispute Management in an Agentic World

Speaker – Neeraj (Citi)

Dispute resolution will shift from human‑centric call centres to agent‑mediated negotiation.
The merchant of record remains the liability holder; agents must forward dispute evidence (transaction logs, provenance records) to the merchant’s existing dispute engine.

Key Point – Chain‑of‑custody records (blockchain or immutable logs) are essential for evidentiary support.

13. Cybersecurity, Rogue Agents, and Persistent Memory

Speaker – Janet George (joined by Prag Sharma)

Top security failures identified: credential misuse, unauthorized content posting, automated web‑crawling attacks, and uncontrolled persistent memory.
Agents must be born with a secure bootstrapping process, have runtime monitoring for anomalous behaviour, and support secure memory eviction.

Recommendation – Implement a defence‑in‑depth stack: identity hardening → behavioural analytics → memory hygiene → post‑mortem forensics.

14. Closing Remarks

The moderator thanked participants, highlighted the rapid evolution that transpired “from morning to afternoon,” and encouraged attendees to spread enthusiasm (“FOMO”) about the emerging AI‑driven commerce ecosystem.
Organisers were praised for documentation and logistical support.

Key Takeaways

Tacit consumer knowledge remains the biggest obstacle; agents need richer, consent‑driven signals to act autonomously.
Early agent‑enabled transactions (e.g., 401(k) filing) demonstrate that trust can be earned through explicit consent loops and controlled lifecycles.
Merchant demand is now driving agent adoption; a 7–9× conversion uplift signals strong commercial incentives.
Three pillars of trustworthy agents – cryptographic identity, granular authorization, and provenance – must be baked into every agent platform.
Governance should embed intentional friction, especially for high‑risk actions, to preserve user agency.
Memory management (working, long‑term, episodic) and de‑instantiation are critical for privacy and security.
Tokenisation provides the financial glue that enables programmable, secure, and audit‑ready agent transactions.
For inclusive growth, agents must be lightweight, locally relevant, and supported by public‑private initiatives targeting small merchants and rural users.
Bias mitigation requires deliberate data‑collection strategies and fairness‑aware recommendation algorithms.
A standardised micropayment layer for agent‑to‑agent services is imminent (≈6 months).
Biometric attestations can be coupled to short‑lived tokens to strengthen payment security.
Dispute resolution will rely on immutable provenance logs; liability remains with the merchant of record.
Cybersecurity must address credential theft, unauthorized actions, and persistent memory abuse through a defence‑in‑depth approach.

These insights collectively outline the technical, regulatory, and societal foundations required to realize a trustworthy, token‑enabled, and inclusive AI‑driven commerce economy.

See Also:

India AI Impact Summit 2026

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