Revolut and Visa announced on Monday, 7 September 2026, that they have completed the first secure payment initiated by an artificial intelligence agent in France, a move that signals growing momentum for autonomous digital commerce. The test involved a real transaction with a French Revolut card on the Visa network, conducted with merchant Cleverbridge. Both companies described the initiative as an effort to understand how AI can act on behalf of consumers while preserving existing safeguards and customer control.
A Real Transaction with a Test Agent
The experiment used a Revolut consumer card entrusted to Visa's test agent, known as My Agent, which initiated a payment under real market conditions. Authentication was handled by Visa Payment Passkey, a biometric alternative to traditional card credentials, and marked the first agentic transaction enabled by this technology in France. The purchase was processed through the Cleverbridge platform using the existing Visa Intelligent Commerce infrastructure.
Revolut said the exercise focused on everyday payment scenarios to better understand how AI-driven purchases could work in real life. The company emphasized that customer consent, issuer controls, and existing protections remained central throughout the transaction. Visa stated that the operation relied on standard card security, identity checks, and real-time fraud monitoring, ensuring no gaps in established safeguards.
Why the Test Matters
The move comes as generative artificial intelligence becomes a regular part of consumer purchasing behaviour. Revolut cited the Digital Barometer 2026, which indicates that 51 percent of the French population uses generative AI tools, with adoption reaching 85 percent among young adults. This shift has prompted payment providers to prepare for a future where intelligent agents search, compare, and complete purchases on behalf of users.
Industry executives underlined that adoption will depend on trust rather than technology alone. Béatrice Cossa-Dumurgier, Revolut's head for Western Europe, said payments must evolve alongside new AI-driven habits while preserving security, transparency, and customer control. Florence Mélique, Visa's European lead, described trust as the real currency in an emerging landscape where consumers delegate certain tasks to intelligent systems under strict safeguards.
A Broader Shift in Payments
The demonstration aligns with Visa's Agentic Ready programme, which explores how agents can act on behalf of consumers under controlled conditions. Revolut, which holds a banking licence in France and serves around eight million customers in the country, positioned the test as a step toward simpler and more intuitive financial experiences. The company also noted that customers remain fully in charge of their decisions, even as the agent handles the practical steps of the purchase.
The initiative follows a similar end-to-end AI payment carried out in Europe by Santander and Mastercard earlier this year. It also comes after Revolut received its French banking licence in early August and reached a valuation of 115 billion dollars following a secondary share sale in July. These developments highlight increasing competition among financial institutions to define the next phase of AI-enabled commerce.
By completing a real payment through an AI agent on existing payment infrastructure, Revolut and Visa have offered an early glimpse of how automated commerce might operate without weakening security. The experiment remains cautious, focusing on routine scenarios and explicit customer authorisation. Whether French consumers are ready to delegate their financial decisions to artificial intelligence is still uncertain, but the foundational technology is now being actively tested in everyday conditions.