Jeong Yu-sin's Fintech Story: The Age of AI Opening Wallets, the Dawn of Agent Commerce

By simply leaving the instruction 'book a flight and hotel from Seoul to Busan with total cost under 500,000 won and shortest travel time,' users receive a confirmation message minutes later that their bookings are complete. AI systems handle searches, selections, reservations, and payments autonomously without requiring users to visit sites or click purchase buttons. This marks the beginning of the 'Agent Commerce' era where AI independently completes transactions across external systems. While growth projections vary by firm, Modore Intelligence forecasts the agent AI market in retail and e-commerce to rise from $4.674 billion in 2025 to $6.043 billion in 2026 (29% growth) and reach $218.4 billion by 2031 (3.6x increase). Key drivers include reducing consumer decision fatigue and search costs, advancements in LLM and API technology enabling full automation, and corporate demand for cost savings in procurement processes.