Merchants Want AI Shopping Agents, But With a Catch

Emily Jones · 2026-09-23

There's a growing gap between the hype around agentic commerce and what's actually happening on the ground. It's not that AI agents can't do the job—the technology is advancing fast. It's more that we're still in the early innings, and merchants are trying to figure out where they fit. Many business owners still hear "agent" and think of independent sales organization (ISO) reseller agents, not artificial intelligence. That confusion alone shows how much education still needs to happen. In a recent PaymentsJournal podcast, Hilla Peled, SVP of AI & Data Science at Nuvei, and Don Apgar, Director of Merchant Payments at Javelin Strategy & Research, dug into agentic commerce from the merchant's point of view. The big question: how do you earn customer trust as this model evolves? But just because there are open questions doesn't mean things are slowing down. If anything, now is the time for merchants and providers to get their strategies in order. ### Preparing for the Agentic Revolution AI is already woven into consumers' daily lives. People use it to compare prices, discover products, and get recommendations. Autonomous personal shopping agents are just the next logical step. Most merchants want to support that shift—but not if it means putting funds at risk or expanding their PCI scope. "Merchants aren't saying, 'give me a shopping agent,' but they want to be prepared to the extent that their customers show up with shopping agents," Apgar said. "Largely, they're trying to figure out what this means, which standard will prevail, and how they should look at their architecture and their position in agentic commerce." Businesses are watching closely to see how transactions will settle and which standards will govern interactions. One of the biggest unknowns is agent ownership: is the agent acting for the consumer, the merchant, or the AI company that built it? That answer will shape how everyone approaches agentic payments. The goal is to build trust by making sure an agent reliably does what it's supposed to do and delivers a result that meets customer expectations. That's a tall order given the fraud and security risks—like bad actors manipulating agents, consumers, or merchants. "One of the biggest things we observe is the gap between what customers are doing when adopting public agents versus what the PSPs and acquirers are willing to take on," Peled said. "Everyone is now just preparing themselves to the point where agentic commerce will become much wider." She added: "We know that 1.5% of purchases in the U.S. have been agentic, which is huge when you think of the current state of agentic commerce. At the same time, both customers and merchants and any business across e-commerce today is wondering, 'What is the next thing they need to do in order to be ready when agentic commerce will explode?'" ### Volume Follows Trust To get a clearer picture, Nuvei surveyed consumers about their attitudes and behaviors. The findings were telling: - Only about 1% of respondents wanted fully automated AI purchasing. - 56% said they would never let an AI platform spend without their approval, no matter the amount. Those numbers might sound like a roadblock. But history shows that consumer preferences can shift as trust builds. Think about how people felt about online banking or mobile payments early on—now they're second nature. The takeaway for merchants? Don't wait for the perfect standard or a fully mature ecosystem. Start small. Experiment with AI-powered tools that keep customers in control. Focus on transparency and security. That's how you earn the right to scale. Agentic commerce isn't a question of if—it's a question of when. The merchants who prepare now will be the ones ready to capture volume when trust catches up.