AI Agents Drive Unprecedented Transactions in February 2026
In a remarkable showcase of technological integration, AI-driven shopping agents executed over 120 million transactions via Alipay’s AI Pay platform during a single week in February 2026.
This revelation stems from a recent report by NielsenIQ, which elucidates the tangible rise of agentic commerce, evolving from mere speculation into a substantive reality.
The report, entitled The Commerce Revolution: Where East Meets West, amalgamates insights from NielsenIQ’s consumer and retail data alongside analyses from luminaries such as McKinsey, Morgan Stanley, and Adobe.
It endeavors to illustrate the chasm between the burgeoning capacity of AI agents and the lukewarm consumer trust that remains a significant hurdle.
According to McKinsey, the global potential for agentic commerce is projected to range between $3 trillion and $5 trillion by the year 2030.
Concurrently, Morgan Stanley anticipates that AI agents could catalyze between $190 billion and $385 billion—approximately 10 to 20 percent—of U.S. eCommerce within the same timeframe.
Asia Leading in Adoption; West in Contemplation
Central to the report’s findings is the disparity in the adoption rates of AI shopping agents. In China, these agents are already facilitating high-volume transactions.
Beyond the impressive 120 million transactions recorded on Alipay’s platform during the week of February 5 to 11, 2026, market data reveals that Alibaba’s Qwen assistant amassed 100 million monthly active users merely two months post-launch.
Conversely, Western markets exhibit a contrasting narrative. Data from Adobe Analytics, as referenced in the report, indicates that traffic originating from generative AI to U.S. retail websites surged by an astounding 1,200 percent between July 2024 and February 2025
Moreover, visitors arriving via generative AI channels demonstrated deeper engagement, characterized by a higher number of pages viewed and reduced bounce rates, despite conversion rates falling short of more traditional traffic sources.
Nevertheless, NielsenIQ’s consumer insights expose a stark divide between the expansive capabilities of AI and consumers’ willingness to embrace them.
Approximately 34 percent of consumers utilize AI for product research, while 23 percent employ it to distill reviews; however, merely 8 percent have permitted AI to finalize a purchase on their behalf.
Emilie Darolles, President of West Europe at NielsenIQ, positioned this disparity as a pivotal challenge for the industry.
“While much of the West is still debating whether AI will shop for us, in parts of Asia it already is, seamlessly executing purchases at a scale that many boardrooms remain unaware of,” she asserted.
However, the crux of the matter transcends mere capabilities; it centers on what consumers are comfortable permitting AI to do.
Shoppers are increasingly inclined to allow AI to conduct research and provide recommendations; yet, an overwhelming majority remain hesitant to grant AI the authority to make purchases.
The forthcoming chapter of agentic commerce will favor brands that cultivate sufficient trust to be selected by both consumers and their AI counterparts, she elaborated.
Influence Surpassing Automation
NielsenIQ elucidated the existing paradigm, noting that AI is currently transforming the convoluted “messy middle” of the purchasing journey—encompassing research, comparison, and selection phases—while fully autonomous transactions remain infrequent.
This shift necessitates a reorientation for brands, moving away from a human-centric purchase funnel toward an agent-mediated one.
When an AI agent curates a trio of products for a consumer’s consideration, the conventional trajectory from impression to click to cart becomes noticeably abbreviated.
Brands lacking comprehensive or machine-readable product information risk exclusion from that critical shortlist.
East Proves Demand; West Constructs Trust Infrastructure
The report presents the East-West dynamic as more collaborative than competitive. China exemplifies the demand aspect of agentic commerce, showcasing agents operating at substantial consumer scale.
In parallel, Western markets are endeavoring to establish the trust and measurement frameworks essential for rendering autonomous purchasing feasible across both high-consideration and routine categories.
NielsenIQ posits that brands best poised to harness these advancements are those actively preparing now: organizing product data for machine readability, ensuring a presence in AI considerations, and embracing measurement strategies designed for a milieu in which the shopper may not be human.
Methodological Insights
The Commerce Revolution: Where East Meets West examines the convergence of Eastern and Western commerce paradigms across live commerce, social commerce, rapid commerce, retail media networks, and emerging agentic commerce.
The findings draw from NielsenIQ Consumer Outlook, Retail Pulse, Digital Purchases, and Omnisales data, along with insights from third-party sources.
Consumer adoption figures concerning AI utilization—34 percent for research, 23 percent for summarizing reviews, and 8 percent for completing purchases—are derived from NielsenIQ’s proprietary consumer data.
Market-scale data from Alipay, Alibaba, McKinsey, Morgan Stanley, and Adobe are referenced but not independently verified by NielsenIQ.
Source link: Smbtech.au.
