Simon Taylor on Where Agentic Spend is Going

Will stablecoins replace cards — or is that narrative missing how payments actually work?

In this episode, Reggie Young sits down with Simon Taylor, founder of Fintech Brainfood and Head of Market Development at Tempo, to unpack one of the most debated topics in fintech: agentic commerce. Simon challenges the idea that stablecoins will displace card networks, explaining why cards don’t move money, how stablecoins actually fit into the stack, and why virtual cards may be the first real payment primitive for AI agents. 

The conversation explores machine-native payments, the rise of agents as customers, and Tempo’s Machine Payments Protocol — a new attempt to rebuild payments infrastructure for the internet era. Simon also shares where adoption will come from, why most narratives get the timing wrong, and what the next battleground in fintech will be.