Visa's Karpin on Stablecoins, Agentic Commerce

Bloomberg

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00:00You know, when we talk about stablecoins, it's actually a $2 trillion space.

00:04How are you looking at stablecoins?

00:06How are you looking to leverage that?

00:08Well, stablecoins are quite a valuable method of exchange, of moving money around.

00:13And that $2 trillion, still the bulk sits into the crypto markets,

00:17where you're settling between cryptos and people are buying, holding, trading.

00:21But it's now moving into payments and money movement.

00:24And that 24 by 7 nature of what stablecoins are,

00:28the cross-border money movement,

00:30the ability to make payments in an efficient and secure way

00:33is something that's going to be quite a big change.

00:36It's going to make a big difference.

00:38And Visa has a network we can build on top of stablecoin rails

00:42to add a lot of value, to leverage all of the different things we already have.

00:46So we're very committed to it.

00:47In a way, it's still quite nascent.

00:49Yes.

00:49You know, in three to five years down the road,

00:53how prominent a business would it be for you?

00:55How prominent a space would it be for Visa?

00:57Well, it's going to be an and.

00:58It's not going to be a replacement.

01:00But it's certainly going to be an important part of it,

01:02particularly in the cross-border money movement side of things,

01:05where businesses are remitting to businesses' money from around the world

01:08in this very efficient way, 24 by 7 settlement for consumers as well.

01:13But we're also seeing payment use cases,

01:15where a buyer, maybe from Latin America,

01:19where currency is a little bit volatile,

01:21it's hard to get access to US dollars,

01:23is buying from a seller in Hong Kong on an e-commerce platform,

01:26and they're using stablecoin to settle.

01:29So that's starting to scale up,

01:31as well as people who hold their crypto balances,

01:34and they want to use the value of that anywhere you can shop at Visa.

01:38And we've already got over 140 different Visa cards

01:42that can settle, can off-ramp from crypto

01:46into the point of sale and acceptance.

01:47And that's making a big difference.

01:49So it will be an important part, but not everything.

01:53The use case would be cross-border,

01:56also for trade,

01:58for countries which are trade-dependent,

02:01like Singapore,

02:02like places like Taiwan, for instance.

02:05I'm just thinking out loud

02:07whether there is that appetite,

02:08that demand for other currency-denominated stablecoins.

02:13This is one of the big debates at the moment.

02:15And there's a circle of thought

02:17which makes a lot of sense in many ways

02:19that economies that do a lot of trade,

02:21like Singapore, like Taiwan,

02:23and many others around the world,

02:27to have a stablecoin in their own currency.

02:30There's another school of thought

02:31that says it might all coalesce around the USD.

02:34But, you know,

02:35I have the luxury of not being able to choose,

02:37but making sure the Visa network

02:38can support those that do scale

02:39with all the right trust.

02:41But I think we're going to find out,

02:44because it's happening.

02:46People are releasing others.

02:47You'll see what flows start making sense,

02:49and the things that end up gaining the traction

02:51will settle the case.

02:54But we're going to support all of those

02:55that have all the attributes of trust.

02:58I want to touch on agentic commerce.

03:00This is a growing space,

03:02you know, where bots don't just assist,

03:04they actually decide for you.

03:06Yes.

03:06How are you looking at that?

03:08This is very exciting.

03:10It's one of the most transformational moments

03:11in commerce in history.

03:14And today, we're already seeing a huge amount of usage.

03:17I think so many people,

03:18there's 700 million active users

03:20per week on ChatGPT all around the world.

03:24They're getting great use out of that.

03:25But you can't make a payment yet with that.

03:29Now, we're changing that.

03:30We're introducing trusted payment credentials

03:33for agents that you or I or anyone

03:36could trust an agent with,

03:37with a visa credential.

03:39We've tailored that environment.

03:41And on the merchant side,

03:42the merchant has to trust

03:43that that agent is a legitimate one

03:46that's going to do the right thing.

03:47So when you have those two things,

03:48you're about to see a massive transformation

03:51where we can hand over our preferences

03:55to then make a payment

03:56to get what we want,

03:57good services anywhere around the world.

03:59It's a big moment.

04:00How will it fundamentally change

04:02the payments ecosystem?

04:04Well, we're building it on top

04:06of the visa ecosystem,

04:07which for the last 60 years,

04:09we're the original fintech.

04:10We've always had trust, security,

04:12acceptance all around the world.

04:14And these are amazing ways

04:15of moving money and getting payments done.

04:18We're tailoring it now

04:19to enable to admit trusted agents

04:22and for merchants to be able

04:24to receive agent payments in there.

04:25So really, on the visa network,

04:27the core of it will not change,

04:29but we're tailoring it

04:31to enable agentic commerce run over it.

04:33And there's a core technology

04:35called tokenization

04:36that is enabling all of this

04:37that we've been working on

04:38for some time now.

04:40Could something like agentic commerce

04:43level the playing field?

04:44We're in a region where you have

04:46700 million SMEs.

04:49How are they?

04:49Are they leapfrogging?

04:50Are they able to adopt such technology?

04:53Yes.

04:53Well, so the visa network admits

04:55the smallest seller,

04:57the largest merchant in the world,

04:59and all of these other participants to play.

05:02And I feel very confident

05:04and compelled by inclusion

05:06of small merchants,

05:08micro small merchants

05:09now getting access

05:10to any customer around the world

05:12that they may want to serve

05:14via agentic commerce

05:15because agents can find them.

05:17They can find them on the visa network,

05:19they pay on the visa network.

05:21So it should really give them access

05:22to more than they have available

05:24to them today.

05:25So that's a very exciting

05:26attribute of that too.

05:27I guess the key thing is trust.

05:31You talk about how, you know,

05:32that is a key issue to adoption.

05:34How are you addressing that concern?

05:36So there's technology to this,

05:38this tokenization layer that we have

05:40where you could provision

05:41your visa credential

05:43and we know that it's you.

05:44You provision that in there.

05:46It's got a couple of other pieces

05:47of data that come with it.

05:48One is your preferences

05:50that enable the agent

05:51to find using an LLM model

05:53your preferences more accurately,

05:55but also the instructions

05:57you have with it

05:58to make sure that the agent

05:59sits within the parameters

06:00that you set.

06:01So that's great on the buyer side.

06:03You go with confidence.

06:04It's going to find what you need.

06:05And then on the merchant side,

06:06we have a now suite of technology

06:10and process and protocol

06:12through the trusted agent protocol

06:15that we've designed for merchants

06:17to very easily

06:18be able to identify

06:20if this is a good agent,

06:22if this is one I want to admit

06:23to my environment to sell to.

06:26And so then you've got trust

06:27on both sides of the transaction.

06:29That is going to be a major unlock

06:30to unleash this for everyone

06:32who wants to use payments

06:34on the visa network in the agent world.

06:35Sorry.

06:36In terms of adoption,

06:37where does Asia sit

06:38in relation to, you know,

06:40the US and Europe, for example?

06:42So huge amount of adoption

06:43like all around the world

06:45that we're seeing.

06:45Plain catch up?

06:46Well, plain catch up

06:47in the sense of

06:47we still haven't unleashed

06:49this into the full environment.

06:51We're still testing and so forth.

06:53But I am very confident

06:54as Asia has proven in the past

06:56that it leapfrogs,

06:58that it moves faster,

06:59that it solves problems quickly.

07:01And it's done

07:01through entrepreneurialism,

07:03it's through necessity,

07:04it's through governments

07:05facilitating that.

07:06So I expect Asia

07:07will be a leader

07:08in agentic commerce

07:09in the very soon period.

07:12And I'm talking months,

07:13not years here.

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