Google Cloud announced Wednesday the launch of Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), an open protocol developed with leading payments and technology companies to securely initiate and transact agent-led payments across platforms, with with over 60 Southeast Asia ecosystem players.

Google Cloud said in a statement that AP2 can be used as an extension of the Agent2Agent (A2A) protocol and Model Context Protocol (MCP).

In concert with industry rules and standards, it establishes a payment-agnostic framework for users, merchants, and payments providers to transact with confidence across all types of payment methods.

With AP2, Google Cloud is now collaborating with a diverse group of more than 60 organizations to help shape the future of agentic payments.

This is including leading Southeast Asia ecosystem players Airwallex, Fiuu, Garena, Lazada, Manus, Razer, Shopee, and ZALORA, and international players like Adyen, American Express, Ant International, Coinbase, JCB, Mastercard, MetaMask, PayPal, Trip.com, UnionPay International, Worldpay, and more.

It is noted that AI agents are capable of transacting on behalf of users, which creates a need to establish a common foundation to securely authenticate, validate, and convey an agent’s authority to transact.

While today’s payment systems generally assume a human is directly clicking “buy” on a trusted surface, the rise of autonomous agents and their ability to initiate a payment breaks this fundamental assumption and raises critical questions that AP2 helps to address,

This is including authorization (proving that a user gave an agent the specific authority to make a particular purchase; authenticity (enabling a merchant to be sure that an agent’s request accurately reflects the user’s true intent; accountability (determining accountability if a fraudulent or incorrect transaction occurs).

“AP2 is an open, shared protocol that provides a common language for secure, compliant transactions between agents and merchants, helping to prevent a fragmented ecosystem,

“It also supports different payment types – from credit and debit cards to stablecoins and real-time bank transfers,” Rao Surapaneni, Vice President and General Manager, Business Applications Platform, Google Cloud.

“This helps ensure a consistent, secure, and scalable experience for users and merchants, while also providing financial institutions with the clarity they need to effectively manage risk,” he added.

Jacob Dai, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer, Airwallex, said Google’s AP2 is a critical step forward in building a secure, interoperable ecosystem for agentic AI payments.

“This protocol gives businesses and consumers the confidence to delegate tasks to AI agents, aligning with Airwallex’s mission to build the future of finance by empowering businesses globally,” he added.

Eng Sheng Guan, Chief Executive Officer, Fiuu, said that as agentic commerce reshapes payments infrastructure, Fiuu supports open protocols like A2A and AP2 to enable secure, scalable agent-to-agent transactions across multi-channel systems, advancing interoperability, trust, and inclusive payment ecosystems.

Pablo Fourez, Chief Digital Officer, Mastercard, said Mastercard is committed to ongoing, responsible innovation, and it is excited to be collaborating with Google, leading banks, merchants, AI platforms, and other industry leaders to help shape the future of agentic commerce.

“These efforts include critical work with standards bodies, such as the FIDO Alliance, where we’re advancing verifiable credentials to capture and secure consumers’ intent in this dynamic new context,

“Together, we’re playing an essential role in securing the payments ecosystem, ensuring that trust and safety remain at the core of every transaction,” he added.

Meanwhile, Mark Micallef, Managing Director, Southeast Asia, Google Cloud, said AP2 provides a trusted foundation to fuel a new era of AI-driven commerce.

According to him, this is particularly relevant for Southeast Asia, where the combined gross merchandise value from e-commerce, online travel, food delivery, transport, and online media reached $263 billion in 2024.

“All of this activity is anchored on the ability to initiate and complete transactions,

“Gross transaction value for digital payments is also growing significantly year-on-year and on track to surpass $2,100 billion in 2030,” he noted.

He also said AP2 establishes the core building blocks for secure transactions that will drive further growth, creating clear opportunities for the industry—including networks, issuers, merchants, and end users—to innovate on adjacent areas like seamless agent authorization.

“We’re committed to evolving this protocol in an open, collaborative process and invite the entire payments and technology community to build this future with us,” he said.

#AgentPaymentsProtocol #AP2 #AgenticCommerce #AIpayments #OpenPaymentsProtocol