Coinbase Calls AI Payments a High-Conviction Bet as Agent Checkout Goes Live

Coinbase Global Inc. (NASDAQ: $COIN) is letting businesses accept payments from AI agents, extending its stablecoin infrastructure into a new checkout lane built for software that can transact on its own.

The feature is rolling out through Coinbase Business and is powered by Coinbase Payments and x402, the open internet payment standard developed by the exchange. Merchants can accept agent payments inside the same product already used for goods and services, without building a separate checkout system.

Head of Coinbase Business Siddharth Coelho-Prabhu said owners can now sell directly to agents with "not any extra work," while the software completes transactions through machine-readable payment instructions.

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Coinbase Business launched in June 2025 and has signed up about 5,000 customers. The unit has processed roughly $1 billion in combined payments and trading volume while growing to a team of about 12 employees.

Coelho-Prabhu described agentic payments as one of Coinbase's "most high-conviction bets," saying the company began investing several years ago after identifying autonomous commerce as a major internet shift.

The exchange is also shipping Coinbase for Agents, which connects AI systems with trading and investment workflows, alongside a software development kit that helps developers add x402 payments to online services.

Coinbase said the pieces now form an end-to-end system. Agents can discover developer documentation, create and fund wallets, pay merchants through Coinbase Business and settle transactions in USDC (CRYPTO: $USDC) across Base or other supported networks.

Early adoption has centred on digital infrastructure. AI agents are already buying API access, domain names, OpenRouter credits and cloud storage from providers including Amazon (NASDAQ: $AMZN) and Google (NASDAQ: $GOOGL). Around 53% of traffic to Base documentation beginning in June came from agentic visitors.

The expansion places stablecoins at the center of Coinbase's AI strategy, giving autonomous software a settlement rail while businesses gain access to a customer base that may increasingly operate without human checkout.

Coinbase Global Inc. (NASDAQ: COIN) is currently trading at $161.16 U.S. per share.