USD Coin accounted for over 99.99% of all agentic transfer volume on Coinbase’s x402 protocol over the past 90 days, establishing a near-complete monopoly in AI-to-AI payments. The protocol grew from zero to 160 million cumulative transactions between mid-2025 and June 2026, with over 90% executed on Base, Coinbase’s Layer 2 network. These machine-to-machine micropayments average roughly $0.13 per transaction, but transfers of $1 or more now represent 95% of total value compared to 49% in early 2025. Circle launched Agent Stack in May 2026, a suite of tools enabling fee-less nanopayments as small as $0.000001. USDC on-chain transaction volume reached $14.8 trillion in Q2 2026, a 151% year-over-year increase, with approximately 400,000 active agents on x402.
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