Modern payment rails are poorly suited for autonomous software. ACH transfers take days to settle, card networks charge high fees, and anti‑fraud systems are designed to flag any activity that looks non‑human. For AI agents expected to execute tasks instantly and automatically, these conditions are bottlenecks.
Worse, the challenges go beyond payments. There’s still no standard framework for proving agent identity, handling delegated authority, or enforcing spending policies. Businesses trying to use agents today often face a dilemma: either grant direct access to corporate accounts or build hacky workarounds that don’t scale.
So how do you let an autonomous agent move money safely and compliantly, without triggering fraud alerts, violating internal controls, or running afoul of regulators?
Catena is tackling exactly that, which is why we are so excited to co-lead the company’s $30 million round of new financing. Instead of shoehorning agents into financial systems designed for humans, Catena is building a new category of regulated financial infrastructure purpose-built for autonomous software. The company provides programmable accounts with built-in controls, allowing operators to define how agents transact across payment rails including wires, ACH, and onchain with stablecoins.
Catena has also been accepted for filing a National Trust Bank charter with the OCC (Office of the Comptroller of the Currency). If fully approved, this would make the company a regulated fiduciary for AI agents, giving businesses and individuals the assurance that their autonomous financial operations can run within a compliant regulatory framework.
Building a bank for machines requires both technical and regulatory expertise. Catena is led by Sean Neville, cofounder of Circle, who helped grow USDC into one of the world’s most widely used digital dollars. He’s joined by veterans from Square, Brex, Affirm, Meta, Amazon, Airwallex, and PayPal, people who have built and run complex systems at global scale.
We’re entering a world where software doesn’t just help businesses answer emails or book meetings, but where it operates the businesses themselves. For that future to work, agents need bank accounts and payment rails they can access programmatically, along with clear rules and controls that keep humans in charge.
We’re excited to support Catena as they build the secure, compliant, and programmable financial infrastructure that will allow AI agents to act on our behalf.
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