U.S.-based payments company Rain has launched Agent Vaults, which lets AI agents pay for purchases, receive money and make transfers using funds supplied by their owners.
Businesses and individuals can fund a vault and decide what an AI agent is allowed to spend the money on. The agent has access only to the funds in the vault and must follow the owner’s instructions.
Rain issues virtual cards for purchases, with spending limits and other restrictions set for each transaction. The cards work at 175 million merchant locations in 200 countries and territories. Agents can also send money to local bank accounts in more than 80 countries.
AI agents can already search for products, compare prices and do much of the work involved in shopping. The payment itself is still a problem. Giving an agent access to someone’s regular card details is not ideal, but asking users to fund a separate wallet adds another step.
With Agent Vaults, payments become part of the partner’s own product. Customers don’t have to leave the platform they’re using to make a purchase. The partner’s name, not Rain’s, appears on the payment statement. Rain stays in the background and provides the payment infrastructure.
Rain CEO and co-founder Farooq Malik said users can fund their accounts, set payment rules and let their agents make purchases through a single integration.
Vaults support bank transfers via ACH, Fedwire, FedNow, SEPA and FPS. Customers can also add funds by card or in stablecoins.
Regardless of the funding method, the balance is held as stablecoins in a non-custodial wallet. This does not mean customers have to buy crypto themselves when adding money through a bank account or card. Rain handles the conversion and uses stablecoins for settlement with card networks.
Each agent gets a virtual Visa or Mastercard for a specific task. The card has a fixed spending limit, merchant restrictions and an expiry date. Rain checks these conditions when a transaction is authorized. Merchants do not need to change their payment systems to accept the cards.
Agents cannot increase their limits or override the restrictions. Cards created for one-time purchases also stop working once an approved transaction has been completed.
Rain illustrates how the system works with a bakery. The owner deposits $5,000 and allows an AI agent to pay suppliers but requires approval for purchases above $1,500. Two supplier payments of $640 and $800 go through automatically. A $2,400 equipment purchase, however, is held for approval because it exceeds the agent’s spending limit.
The company also sees potential uses in online shopping, payments to individuals and other AI agents, and micropayments for API calls. Businesses could also use vaults to make payouts once certain conditions are met.
Visa and Mastercard Integration
Rain is a Principal Member of Visa and Mastercard and is enabling Agent Vaults for Visa Intelligent Commerce and Mastercard Agent Pay.
Cards issued through the service will carry credentials from the payment networks. Transactions initiated by AI agents can be identified as having been made with the customer’s approval. Merchants and card issuers can also see the limits and conditions attached to these payments.
The launch builds on Rain’s Agent Control Layer and expands its existing card infrastructure.
Rain’s payout infrastructure supports card and wallet issuance and management, as well as transfers and settlements across blockchain networks and other payment providers.
Rain is a founding member of the Agentic Payments Alliance. The company is currently working with AI agent developers, marketplaces and payment platforms on Agent Vaults.
