American Express published its Intent Intelligence framework on 13 October 2026, setting out how it recommends capturing and authenticating a customer’s purchase intent before an AI agent completes a transaction.
Amex says it is making the framework public to help advance a common industry approach for intent in agentic commerce. The release gives no price, no adoption figures and no list of companies using it.
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The key insight: As we read it, the framework turns the customer’s sign-off into data that travels with the payment: Amex says the authorized intent is used to scope the payment credential the agent uses at checkout.
According to the release, the framework makes a customer’s authorized purchase intent available to the card issuer earlier in the transaction, before an agent executes a purchase, so that the intent can serve as a control throughout the transaction. Amex says it is available through its Agentic Commerce Experiences (ACE) Developer Kit.
“Building trust into AI-powered transactions is critical to the adoption of agentic commerce,” said Luke Gebb, Head of Global Innovation at American Express.
The four steps American Express describes in its 13 October 2026 Intent Intelligence release: create and confirm intent, an Intent ID and Proof of Intent Token, a payment credential scoped to that intent, and the intent applied in later checks.
How the Intent Check Works
The release describes four steps. A Create Intent API captures the customer’s purchase instructions and constraints, such as the merchant, a maximum budget and other preferences, and the customer then authenticates their identity and signs off on the intent the agent captured.
An Intent ID and a Proof of Intent Token are then created. Amex says the token can be used to obtain a secure digital payment credential that the agent uses at checkout instead of the customer’s actual card number, and that the authorized intent is used to scope that credential.
In the last step, Amex says the Intent ID and the token can serve as controls in later steps of the purchase, supporting fraud prevention, authorization decisions and dispute resolution.
Where It Fits in Amex’s Agent Plan
Intent Intelligence is one of five services Amex listed when it introduced the ACE Developer Kit on 14 April 2026, alongside agent registration, account enablement, payment credentials and cart context, according to that earlier release.
In the same April release, Amex announced Amex Agent Purchase Protection. It said that in the future, if a Card Member authorizes an AI agent to buy something and the agent sends Amex the customer’s authenticated purchase intent, Amex will protect eligible customers from charges related to AI agent error.
What Amex’s 13 October and 14 April 2026 releases state about Intent Intelligence (orange) and do not give (grey).
Standards Work
Amex says it is engaging with EMVCo to support secure card-based agentic transactions and supporting the x402 Foundation’s work on standards for internet-native payments. It describes itself as both an issuer and a network, a position it says spans both sides of a payment.
The Structural Reading
As we read it, Amex is trying to make the customer’s approved intent a piece of data that travels with the payment, so the issuer can check an agent’s purchase against what the customer actually signed off.
As we read it, publishing the framework openly is a bid to have that intent record become shared plumbing across agentic commerce rather than an Amex-only feature; the release does not say whether any other network or agent platform has adopted it.
The Structural Read
Amex says the customer authenticates and signs off on the intent the agent captured, and that an Intent ID and a Proof of Intent Token are then created.
Amex says the token can be used to obtain a secure digital payment credential that the agent uses instead of the customer’s actual card number.
As we read it, the design gives the issuer a record of what was approved before the purchase, rather than after a dispute.
Luke Gebb, Head of Global Innovation, American Express, in the release of 13 October 2026
“Providing authorized purchase intent before an agent transacts can give issuers greater confidence that an agent is acting as a customer intended”
Three Implications
CARD MEMBERS The April release says Amex Agent Purchase Protection will, in the future, protect eligible customers from charges related to AI agent error when the agent sends Amex the authenticated purchase intent.
DEVELOPERS Amex says Intent Intelligence is available through its ACE Developer Kit, one of five services the kit lists.
THE WIDER INDUSTRY Amex says it is engaging with EMVCo and supporting the x402 Foundation’s work, and that it wants a common industry approach for intent in agentic commerce.
The framework puts it this way: “In the embedding era, value comes from what the software connects to.”
As we read it, Amex is trying to make its intent record one of the things agent purchases connect to, by publishing it as an approach others can adopt.
What Is Not Established
The 13 October release gives no launch metrics, no named agent platforms, merchants or issuers using Intent Intelligence, and no date for Agent Purchase Protection, which the April release described as a future commitment. Liability details beyond that April commitment are not in either release.
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American Express has published a framework for recording and checking what a customer approved before an AI agent buys on their behalf, offered through its ACE Developer Kit. Amex says it wants the approach to become common across the industry; it has not said who is using it yet.
A note on sourcing. This piece is based on American Express’s release of 13 October 2026, distributed by Business Wire and read in full the same day, and on Amex’s own newsroom release of 14 April 2026 introducing the ACE Developer Kit and Agent Purchase Protection, also read in full. Nothing here is a forecast, and nothing here is financial or investment advice.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur, HackerNoon and Search Engine People. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
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