Why Your AI Agent Needs a Wallet: USDC and Nanopayments — Harshal Bhangale, Circle

An agent that discovers a paid API still needs a way to authorize payment before receiving its result. The talk description presents this as a missing part of otherwise capable workflows. Circle's nanopayment design uses a prefunded USDC stablecoin balance: the agent signs a payment authorization, the merchant submits it for verification, and the service checks the signature and available funds. Blockchain settlement follows later in batches. Separating immediate authorization from batched settlement is intended to make very small, frequent service purchases practical.