Stripe Unveils Payments for AI Agents Using USDC and x402 Protocol

Stripe unveils AI agent payments using USDC and x402 protocol.

Payment giant Stripe has announced a preview version of its “machine payments” tool. This solution allows developers to charge AI agents using the stablecoin USDC on the Base network and the x402 protocol.

Autonomous agents are an entirely new category of users to build for, and, increasingly, to sell to.

Today, we’re launching (a preview) of machine payments on @stripe—a way for developers to directly charge agents, with a few lines of code. 🤖💸

$ Let’s start tinkering… ⤵️

— Jeff Weinstein (@jeff_weinstein) February 10, 2026

Product manager Jeff Weinstein noted that the company plans to expand the list of supported assets, blockchains, and protocols in the future.

Technical Implementation

The system is based on the PaymentIntents API. It allows businesses to programmatically charge agents for HTTP requests, API usage, or Model Context Protocol calls.

The solution is built on Coinbase’s open x402 standard. It employs the previously inactive HTTP 402 status code (“Payment Required”) to conduct on-chain transactions directly within a web request.

Weinstein emphasized that the traditional financial system is designed for humans and does not meet the needs of AI agents, which require microtransactions, 24/7 global availability, and guarantees of instant finality.

Operational mechanism:

• The developer creates a PaymentIntent;
• Stripe generates a deposit address;
• The details are provided to the agent for payment;
• The transaction status is tracked via API, webhooks, or dashboard.

Taxes, refunds, and reporting are handled through Stripe’s standard tools. Direct interaction with crypto components is optional for developers. For testing, the company has released a CLI utility called purl and code samples in Node and Python.

Company Valuation

The product announcement coincided with Bloomberg’s report on Stripe preparing a new tender offer. The deal could raise the fintech giant’s valuation to $140 billion, a 31% increase from last year’s $107 billion.

In 2023, the company raised $6.5 billion in a Series I funding round led by Thrive Capital.

CoinGecko Implements Micropayments

Simultaneously, aggregator CoinGecko launched API endpoints supporting x402. The integration shifts the service to a pay-per-use model.

Now, autonomous agents can access market and on-chain data at a fixed rate of $0.01 USDC per request. No account registration or API key is required.

Functionality

The tool provides access to quotes and metrics for over 18,000 assets across 250 networks. This enables developers to create autonomous arbitrage scanners and on-chain risk monitoring systems.

The interaction is implemented via a “handshake” principle. When accessing an endpoint, the server returns a response with a 402 code and payment details. The agent conducts a transaction in USDC and attaches its confirmation to a repeat request, which instantly grants access to the information.

Earlier, JPMorgan analysts suggested that Stripe would lead the “dual revolution in artificial intelligence and money movement.”