Yesterday Cloudflare announced plans to introduce the NET dollar stablecoin to power AI agentic payments and new business models. Earlier in the week it said it was forming the x402 foundation in collaboration with Coinbase. The x402 protocol is a standard that aims to enable automated online payments. Coinbase unveiled its work on the project in May.
The vision is that AI agents will handle many of our everyday tasks, but will need to be able to make payments to do so, whether that’s accessing an API or booking a holiday. Stablecoins are one of the options for those payments. Automation will also help to drive new internet business models.
“For decades, the business model of the Internet ran on ad platforms and bank transfers. The Internet’s next business model will be powered by pay-per-use, fractional payments, and microtransactions—tools that shift incentives toward original, creative content that actually adds value,” said Matthew Prince, co-founder and CEO of Cloudflare. “By using our global network, we are going to help modernize the financial rails needed to move money at the speed of the Internet, helping to create a more open and valuable Internet for everyone.”
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