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@Steven Hatton:

Your OP says "every transaction". Every transaction under a Recurring Payments mandate is NOT authorized by the payor. Only the mandate is authorized upfront and only once. Recurring payments under the pre-approved mandate happen without any human intervention. 

While your questions about AI Agents are totally valid, I have a feeling that the Google protocol AP2 described in the original article works at the interface between the AI Agent and Merchant whereas your questions pertain to the interface between the human consumer and AI Agent. Accordingly, I think consumer's authorization of AI Agent to act on his / her behalf is outside the scope of AP2. But let's see what the author of the article says. 

@Steven Hatton: Hopefully verified and authenticated but probably not necessarily authorized. Where's the fun in using an autonomous AI Agent to automate workflow if it still requires manual intervention for every transaction? Even without AI Agent technology, recurring payments / standing orders / direct debits etc. have been happening for a long time without the human payor authorizing every payment. 

The disconnect is not about AI's value propositions per se but about whom the value propositions accrue to. 

In your post, the value propositions were projected as consumer-centric, which didn't float my boat. In your comment about UWM, BC and SEB, your value propositions are supplier-centric, which I totally agree with. 

Let me take "portfolio rebalancing" as an example. 

There are three actors: Consumer / Investor, Supplier / Provider, and Portfolio. 

Even in the days of Covestor / Kaching without AI, the investor enjoyed the rebalancing feature / benefit. Even today, with AI, the investor enjoys the same rebalancing feature / benefit. I can't sense any sensational difference. 

However, in the past, the supplier probably relied on "Anonymous Indian" (then known as AI) to deliver the said feature whereas, now, the supplier relies on "Artificial Intelligence" (now known as AI) to do so. I can sense a sensational difference.