How does an AI agent pay a business when it only knows the company name?

Through a Merchant Payment Endpoint (MPE). The agent sends the company name or VAT number to a resolve API, which resolves the payee only from provable sources — the verified merchant registry, the merchant's signed payment manifest, or a structured e-invoice (EN16931) — returns the IBAN/BIC with a logged provenance and confidence level, and discloses the verification method used, so the agent always knows the origin of the account. AsterPay's MPE does this in one call: GET /v1/mpe/merchants/resolve?business_id=FI-DEMO-0001&business_id_type=demo (a public demo merchant you can call right away).

What is a Merchant Payment Endpoint (MPE)?

A Merchant Payment Endpoint is an API layer that turns a business identity (legal name, VAT number, registry ID) into validated, machine-usable payment details — an IBAN/BIC with full structure and checksum validation and a disclosed verification method. It solves the discovery half of agent payments: agents know who they want to pay long before they know where to send the money. AsterPay operates an MPE as Layer 2 of its agent commerce stack, between KYA trust scoring (Layer 1) and EUR settlement (Layer 3).

How is the IBAN verified to prevent paying the wrong account?

The IBAN is only ever resolved from a provable source (verified registry, the merchant's signed manifest, or a structured e-invoice) and tagged with a provenance and confidence level. Every resolved IBAN passes full structure and checksum validation, and every API response discloses the verification method used (vop_method). Bank-side PSD2 Verification of Payee — the EU-mandated name-matching check banks run on SEPA payments — is run through the licensed settlement PSP at payout where available; until that partner check runs, the response reports its status honestly and the MPE never claims a name match it has not performed. This gives agents an accurate view of which checks have run before they pay.

Can the agent resolve and pay in a single API call?

Yes. AsterPay's POST /v1/mpe/settle runs the full pipeline in one request: resolve the merchant, validate the account, check the paying agent's KYA trust score, then execute the USDC-to-EUR conversion and SEPA Instant payout. The agent pays in USDC; the business receives euros in its bank account, typically in under 10 seconds.

What does MPE resolution cost?

Merchant resolution (GET /v1/mpe/merchants/resolve) is free at AsterPay. The settlement step carries the standard EUR settlement fee: 0.5% + EUR 0.10 per transaction on the EU rail. There is no subscription and no token — pricing is pay-per-settlement.

← Learn

How do AI agents pay any business? The Merchant Payment Endpoint (MPE) explained

By Petteri, Co-founder of AsterPay · Last updated 9 June 2026 · 4 min read

Answer An AI agent usually knows who it wants to pay — "Acme GmbH", a VAT number, an invoice header — but not where to send the money. A Merchant Payment Endpoint (MPE) closes that gap: it resolves a business name or VAT number to validated payment details (IBAN/BIC with full structure and checksum validation, verification method disclosed in every response), and can chain straight into settlement. AsterPay operates an MPE as Layer 2 of its agent commerce stack — resolution is free, and POST /v1/mpe/settle runs resolve → validate → trust check → SEPA Instant payout in one call.

The problem nobody built for

Agent payment protocols like x402 assume the agent already has a recipient address. Real commerce does not work that way. An agent processing an invoice, restocking inventory, or paying a supplier starts from a business identity: a legal name, a VAT number, a registry entry. Between that identity and a SEPA payment lies the lookup problem — and getting it wrong means money sent to the wrong account, which is exactly how invoice fraud drains billions from human accounts-payable teams every year.

What the MPE does

Resolve — GET /v1/mpe/merchants/resolve?business_id=FI-DEMO-0001&business_id_type=demo (a public demo merchant) resolves the payee only from provable sources: AsterPay's verified merchant registry, the merchant's signed payment manifest (/.well-known/pay.json), or a structured e-invoice (EN16931 UBL/CII). Every resolved IBAN carries a logged provenance and confidence level (verified / document / asserted), so the agent always knows the origin of the account it is about to pay.
Validate — the resolved IBAN passes full structure and checksum validation, and every response discloses the verification method used (vop_method). Bank-side PSD2 Verification of Payee (VoP) name matching is being added via partner PSPs; the MPE never claims a name match it has not performed.
Settle — POST /v1/mpe/settle chains the full pipeline: resolve, payee validation, the paying agent's KYA trust check, then USDC→EUR conversion and SEPA Instant payout. Agent pays stablecoins; the business receives euros, typically in under 10 seconds.

Where MPE sits in the stack

Layer	Question it answers	AsterPay surface
Layer 1 — KYA trust	"Can I trust this agent?"	Trust score 0–100, sanctions, ERC-8004 identity
Layer 2 — MPE	"Where do I send the money?"	Resolve + validated IBAN
Layer 3 — Settlement	"How does it become euros?"	USDC→EUR via SEPA Instant

What it costs

Resolution is free. Settlement carries the standard EUR fee: 0.5% + €0.10 per transaction on the EU rail (1.5% + €1.00 on the US rail). No subscription, no token — pay per settlement.

Try it

# Resolve a merchant by VAT number (free, no auth)
curl "https://x402.asterpay.io/v1/mpe/merchants/resolve?business_id=FI-DEMO-0001&business_id_type=demo"

# Full pipeline: resolve → validate → KYA → SEPA Instant
curl -X POST "https://x402.asterpay.io/v1/mpe/settle" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"business_id":"FI-DEMO-0001","business_id_type":"demo","amount_usdc":250}'