The Payment Expert Podcast is joined by myTU’s Ignas Dovidonis to discuss what AI agents can already buy, where regulation lags agentic payments, and how compliance teams can automate anti-money laundering checks
In the latest episode of the Payment Expert Podcast, Ignas Dovidonis, AML and CTF Compliance Officer at myTU, an AI-native digital bank based in Lithuania, says AI agents can already complete an entire online purchase – searching, comparing, filling the basket and checking out – but regulation still authorises single transactions rather than the open-ended intent that agentic payments run on.
Agents need underlying authorisation from the account holder, Dovidonis says. Payment rails still require human consent through a token, a limit or a mandate the person sets.
Card networks already settle agent-initiated transactions on existing rails. Mastercard’s Agent Pay uses tokenised credentials scoped to a specific agent, merchant and spend limit, and OpenAI’s Instant Checkout in ChatGPT settles through the same network tokens.
myTU: Agentc run on intent, not rules
Agents work on intent rather than rules, Dovidonis says: a customer says “keep my office supplies stocked and don’t spend more than £500,” and the agent decides the timing and the amount without further instruction.
The law describes consent for one specific payment, he says, and authorising an intent – a goal for the agent to act within – is not yet regulated. He calls it a grey area.
Dovidonis also looks at the difference between the UK and Lithuanian regimes. The UK splits liability 50/50 between sending and receiving payment providers for authorised push payment fraud, in force since 7 October 2024.
Lithuania has no equivalent split, he says; liability usually sits with the service provider because the customer is treated as the weaker party. The EU AI Act classifies financial services as high-risk and is now being enforced.
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