The European Central Bank (ECB) has invited companies to help it study how AI agents, micropayments and machine-to-machine transactions could work with a digital euro, adding artificial intelligence to a new round of innovation work on the planned currency. The ECB published the call for expressions of interest on September 28, opening a new wave of its digital euro innovation platform after the first launched in 2024. Organisations have until November 9, 2026, to apply, while the ECB plans to publish the list of selected participants in January 2027.
ECB Explores AI-Powered Payment Use Cases
The AI focus area sits within the Exploration workstream, which the Eurosystem will run through one-off workshops at the ECB’s Frankfurt headquarters in the first half of 2027. The workshops will examine AI-enabled payment experiences, AI agents, micropayments, machine-to-machine interactions and new user-facing features inside payment apps. The ECB wants participants to explore how these developments could create new payment use cases for consumers and businesses and what they could mean for the future design of the digital euro.
Participants must also show how their proposals fit the currency’s design principles, including privacy, trust, user control and data protection. Cybersecurity, fraud prevention, compliance and risk management are outside the scope of the AI work. A separate Experimentation workstream will run from January to June 2027. Selected firms will build proofs of concept around electronic receipts, multi-payer and multi-payee transactions, conditional payments and front-end features.
The ECB lists AI-enhanced features and behavioural biometrics among the front-end options participants may test. The central bank also reiterated that the digital euro would not be programmable money. The ECB named payment service providers, technical service providers, merchants, consumer organisations, academic institutions and fintech companies as the main targets for the AI workshop. Applicants must be legally registered organisations established in the European Union.
The central bank encourages joint applications that bring together different roles, such as merchants and payment service providers. Participants will not receive compensation for their work.
Investor Takeaway
The ECB is inviting EU-based organisations to explore AI agents, micropayments and machine-to-machine payments for potential digital euro use cases.
Digital Euro Moves Toward Live Testing
The call comes as the ECB moves the digital euro closer to live testing. In July, the central bank selected 36 payment service providers for a 12-month digital euro pilot starting in the second half of 2027. The pilot will run on a beta version of the currency without legal tender status. The ECB has also estimated that introducing the digital euro could cost European banks between €4 billion and €6 billion over four years, according to previous coverage of the central bank’s digital euro plans.
The AI initiative comes as private-sector payment companies experiment with autonomous agents that can interact with merchants and complete transactions on behalf of consumers. Meta’s Muse agent can negotiate and complete purchases through Stripe Link single-use cards. PayPal recently joined the Muse payments network, following its earlier agreement to bring PayPal checkout into ChatGPT.
MoonPay is also exploring agent-driven payments through PayBox, which can reach Grok through a custom connector that users must authorize. The development follows broader experimentation with AI agents that can read information, negotiate purchases and complete payments.
Investor Takeaway
The AI initiative comes as the ECB prepares for a 12-month digital euro pilot involving 36 payment service providers from the second half of 2027.
