Mastercard completes New Zealand’s first authenticated agentic transactions with Westpac, bringing trust, transparency and security to AI-powered commerce

The milestone follows Mastercard’s recent authenticated agentic transactions in Australia and signals growing regional momentum behind trusted AI-powered commerce

Agentic commerce sees AI-powered agents search for, discover, and in some instances even make purchases on behalf of consumers. It’s an exciting opportunity for New Zealanders, with research showing 69% of consumers are convinced agentic AI will make their lives easier^[1]. Specifically, AI that can interpret intent, make decisions and take autonomous action appeals to 75% ^[1] of consumers.

Mastercard is accelerating this future by completing New Zealand’s first fully authenticated agentic transactions on its network, as it continues to scale its Agent Pay solution across the region.

By enabling fully recognized and authenticated agentic transactions, Mastercard’s trusted agentic framework process brings AI agents into the payment flow as visible, governed participants – ensuring that every transaction is secure, transparent, and trusted.

Unlocking agentic commerce: Interoperability and standards for consumers and businesses

Mastercard’s Agent Pay framework enables seamless interoperability between issuers, acquirers and merchants. By adhering to industry standards, consumers and businesses benefit from trusted and consistent agent-powered experiences – regardless of which partners or platforms are involved.

New Zealand’s first Agent Pay transaction saw Mastercard use a Westpac-issued debit card to purchase cinema tickets from Event Cinemas. The transaction was fully authorized with cardholder consent, and every participant in the payment flow – issuer, acquirer and merchant – could see and recognize that an agent conducted the transaction.

Building on this, a separate transaction booked accommodation with QT Hotels & Resorts in Queenstown, demonstrating how agentic payments could support travel bookings. Both transactions were processed through IPSI and completed using Maincode’s large language model, Matilda, reinforcing the flexibility and scalability of agentic commerce across different payment environments.

“New Zealand has the potential to be leaders in digital payments again, and this milestone is testament to that,” said Megan Simons, Country Manager for New Zealand and the Pacific Islands. “Our role is to ensure this future is built on trust, security and transparency, the same standards New Zealanders expect from everyday card payments. We’re proud to partner with Westpac on this initiative, demonstrating what’s possible when technology is matched with strong governance.”

Westpac NZ Managing Director of Product, Sustainability and Marketing, Sarah Hearn, says the bank is looking forward to rolling out this cutting-edge technology: “We’re investing heavily in innovative technology and processes to make banking faster, safer and easier for New Zealanders.  Agentic AI has huge potential to improve payment experiences, and we’re pleased to be working with Mastercard to bring the technology to our customers in the future”.

Accelerating agentic commerce across Australasia and beyond

Mastercard is focused on advancing agentic commerce across Australasia and Asia Pacific with additional efforts:

• Establishing a regional AI Centre of Excellence to accelerate innovation and governance for agentic commerce
• Building deep partnerships with leading LLM providers across Asia Pacific
• Deploying dedicated agentic commerce teams across the region to support financial institutions and merchants as they transition to agent-led experiences – including a dedicated team based at Mastercard’s Sydney Tech Hub

In New Zealand, there is already a growing desire to use AI assistants for shopping, with entertainment (36%), clothing (34%), and health and beauty (32%) popular categories^[1]. Among the shoppers already using AI assistants, 83% report positive experiences^[1].

Delivering transparency and trust in every agentic transaction

Transparency in agentic commerce is vital for building trust, enhancing security, and protecting all parties involved in a transaction. When AI-powered agents lead purchases, ensuring visibility throughout the payment flow allows issuers, acquirers and merchants to apply robust controls, resolve disputes efficiently and detect fraud patterns more effectively. Mastercard Agent Pay recognizes and authenticates agents, paving the way for transparent, governed agentic commerce experiences and setting a new standard for security and reliability.

This latest milestone in New Zealand follows successful Agent Pay launches in the U.S., as well as pilots in Australia, the UAE and Latin America, and is part of Mastercard’s ongoing global commitment to responsible innovation and industry collaboration. Mastercard continues to work with leading technology partners and standards bodies to shape the future of agentic commerce worldwide.

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^[1]Adobe: AI Revolution: New Zealand consumers signal shift to personalized agentic experiences

Additional quotes from partners:

Lukas Wesemann, AI Research at Maincode, said: “Building AI systems that can not only reason but reliably act and facilitate payments is a fundamental shift in how business will be done online. The opportunities with this are huge. Exploring this frontier in partnership with Mastercard has connected our foundational tech to a key use case. We’re excited to build the AI systems that run this from the model weights to the inference stack to the AI-native user interfaces.”

Jarrett Baker, Head of Product at IPSI said: “The payments landscape is evolving rapidly as AI capabilities become increasingly integrated into checkout and payment experiences. We're witnessing a fundamental shift in how consumers interact with commerce, and intelligent payment orchestration is at the heart of this transformation. As a leader in payment technology and innovation in APAC for 20 years, we're excited to be shaping the future of payments alongside Mastercard and its partners – delivering experiences that are not only safe and secure, but genuinely intelligent and adaptive to each customer's needs.”

Andrew Turner, Group General Manager Technology and Digital Transformation at EVT said: “Agent-powered commerce could reshape how New Zealanders discover, book and experience entertainment and travel, and EVT is proud to be part of this milestone with Mastercard. We are focused on making it effortless for guests to book a movie at Event Cinemas or plan a stay at a QT or Rydges, and authenticated agent-led transactions show how AI could make those moments even more seamless. Importantly, this innovation is built on the transparency and security our guests expect, offering an exciting glimpse into a future where trusted technology enhances every stage of the customer experience.”