Agent capital reference
Glossary
Definitions for agent capital terms: agent wallet, allowance, x402, AP2, ACP, facilitator, payment mandate, spend policy, and excessive agency.
Updated
2026-07-06
Status
Source-backed. Educational. Not financial advice.
Key facts
What this page establishes
- Agent finance language is still settling, so definitions should stay practical and source-linked.
- Agent wallet, allowance, mandate, spend policy, and treasury reconciliation are separate concepts.
- Protocol-specific terms such as x402, AP2, and ACP should be routed back to primary docs where possible.
- The glossary supports citation and internal linking across the agent-capital topic cluster.
Agent finance language is still settling. This glossary uses practical definitions for builders and reviewers. For source-specific terms, follow the linked primary docs: x402, AP2, ACP, and Agentic Wallet.
Agent capital
The financial operating layer around autonomous agents: wallets, payment authority, controls, treasury records, and risk management.
Agent wallet
A wallet, payment credential, or wallet tool that an AI agent can use to request or execute money movement within defined limits.
Allowance
A bounded permission to spend up to a defined amount, with a defined counterparty, purpose, time window, or rail.
Spend policy
The rules that decide whether an agent payment is allowed, denied, escalated, or frozen.
x402
An HTTP-native payment protocol built around Payment Required responses and programmatic payment payloads.
Facilitator
In x402, a verification and settlement layer that helps servers confirm payment without running all blockchain infrastructure directly.
AP2
Agent Payments Protocol, a protocol focused on secure, interoperable agent commerce with verifiable intent and accountability.
ACP
Agentic Commerce Protocol, an open checkout standard for buyers, AI agents, and businesses to complete purchases.
Mandate
A signed or otherwise verifiable record of user or business authority for an agent to act within constraints.
Merchant allowlist
A set of approved merchants, domains, wallet addresses, or seller identities an agent may pay.
Payment token
A scoped credential that can authorize payment without exposing the underlying card or account details.
Session budget
A budget that expires when a task, time window, or conversation ends.
Treasury reconciliation
The process of matching agent intent, authorization, settlement, receipt, fee, refund, and ledger classification.
Excessive agency
A security risk where an LLM or agent has too much autonomy to take consequential action without adequate checks.
Prompt injection
A malicious or accidental instruction in model input that attempts to alter the agent behavior or tool use.
Custody
Control or safekeeping of assets or credentials, with legal meaning that depends on the asset and business model.
Settlement
Final or effective completion of the value transfer on the chosen rail.