The race to make artificial intelligence commercially autonomous took a significant step forward in Abu Dhabi this week, where AI agents were used to make real-world purchases without requiring human approval, highlighting a broader shift towards what technology firms call the “agentic economy”.
At a build day hosted by XDC Network at Hub71, AI agents bought coffee and merchandise from merchants before paying each other for services using USDC, a dollar-pegged stablecoin. More than 200 developers, founders and technology enthusiasts participated in the event, dubbed Unsupervised, with agent-driven transactions exceeding $1,000 by the end of the day.
The exercise reflected a growing trend in artificial intelligence: moving beyond answering questions and making recommendations to carrying out economic activity on behalf of users.
“AI agents can already search, compare and recommend better than most people. The one thing they still couldn’t do was pay. This week, we closed that gap,” said Jeremy Noori, Head of Structured Products at XDC Network.
“Agents bought coffee, picked up merchandise and paid each other for services in real money, without anyone reaching for a card. Agentic payments are no longer a future idea. They are happening at the coffee counter today.”
The event was held in partnership with the Middle East Stablecoin Association (MESA), reflecting growing interest among policymakers, financial institutions and technology companies in how digital payments infrastructure could support autonomous AI systems.
Participants created AI agents using Replit and connected them to XDC AI, a marketplace where agents can pay for goods and services. Each agent was assigned its own digital wallet funded with USDC credits, while XDC Network covered transaction fees to simplify testing.
While retail purchases drew attention, many attendees explored more complex applications. These included trade finance processes executed by agents, healthcare services paid for on a usage basis, and gaming environments where agents purchase subscriptions or unlock digital assets autonomously.
The discussions also highlighted a key question facing regulators: how to supervise AI-driven transactions without slowing innovation. A panel featuring representatives from XDC Network and MESA examined how banks, stablecoin issuers and regulators could oversee agent-to-agent payments while maintaining appropriate safeguards.
The choice of Abu Dhabi as the venue was notable. Hub71 operates within Abu Dhabi Global Market, a financial centre that has positioned itself as a regional hub for digital asset activity through its regulatory framework.
As AI capabilities advance rapidly, the industry is increasingly focused on a practical challenge: enabling software not just to think and recommend, but to pay. The experiments in Abu Dhabi suggest that transition may already be underway.
Source: Khaleej Times