Agentic Commerce: Where Trust Is the Choke Point
As agentic commerce continues to grow, trust has become the choke point for autonomous transactions. Companies like Fair Isaac (FICO) and Shopify are already reaping the benefits of this trend. FICO's credit scores are used by lenders across the US, and its AI decisioning layer is being adopted by regional and money-center banks.
Shopify's Universal Commerce Protocol has made it easy for agents to transact with customers on behalf of returning buyers. The company's AI-driven orders have tripled year over year, and its GMV reached $116 billion in the last quarter.
Visa has explicitly built agentic rails into its Visa-as-a-Service stack and is positioning itself as the trust arbiter in this new landscape. Amazon, on the other hand, owns the agent, the storefront, and the cloud under both, making it a vertically integrated bet. Affirm, meanwhile, offers transparent installment credit with fixed schedules and no fine print.
The market has yet to fully price in these developments, and investors are looking for companies that can capitalize on this trend. With Fair Isaac's shares down 41.9% year-to-date and Shopify's down 18.9%, there may be opportunities for those who are willing to take a chance.