Amex ‘Proof of Intent’: The Issuer Side Enters the Agentic Checkout Wars

The battle to define “agentic checkout” officially has a sixth voice. Following our mapping of five competing definitions —which collectively left merchants holding the bag for autonomous errors—American Express has stepped into the fray with its Intent Intelligence Framework , unveiled at TechCrunch Disrupt on October 13. If the industry’s current trajectory is a landscape of unverified agents spending corporate capital, Amex is attempting to build the technical foundation for the “registered agent” concept hinted at in its earlier Business Playbook . The framework introduces a technical layer designed to move beyond mere policy-based protection and into cryptographic verification.