Alex Criss, PayPal Inc. CEO
Provided by: PayPal
PayPal has signed a deal with OpenAI to integrate its digital wallet into ChatGPT, allowing users to pay for products they discover through the leading consumer AI tool, the company exclusively tells CNBC.
The deal, signed last weekend, means both sides of PayPal’s ecosystem will be able to connect to ChatGPT starting next year. PayPal CEO Alex Criss said PayPal’s users will be able to purchase products through the AI platform, and merchants will be able to list and sell their inventory there.
“We have hundreds of millions of loyal PayPal wallet holders who will be able to click the ‘Buy with PayPal’ button on ChatGPT and have a safe and secure checkout experience,” Chris said in an interview.
The move makes PayPal an early part of OpenAI’s efforts to expand the use of ChatGPT for e-commerce. The idea is that over 700 million users every week can use artificial intelligence to find products, just like a human personal shopper. Last month, OpenAI announced that users would be able to buy from Shopify and Etsy merchants, and two weeks ago it announced an e-commerce deal with Walmart.
“This is a whole new paradigm in shopping,” Chris says. “It’s hard to imagine that agent commerce won’t be an important part of the future.”
PayPal announced recent deals with Google and artificial intelligence company Perplexity to position itself as the payments backbone of the coming AI shopping era.
The company also manages merchant routing, payment validation, and behind-the-scenes aspects of payment processing for PayPal merchants on ChatGPT, so individual merchants do not need to sign up for OpenAI, the company said.
Chris touted the fact that both consumers and merchants are verified by fintech companies, reducing the risk of fraud for both groups. Users can withdraw funds from linked bank accounts, credit cards, or stored balances to pay for purchases, and also receive protection, package tracking, and dispute resolution.
“It’s not just that a deal could happen,” Chris said. “This means that PayPal offers the world’s largest merchant network, a collection of trusted merchants, and the largest collection of verified consumers within a consumer’s wallet.”
PayPal also said it will expand its use of OpenAI’s enterprise AI products for employees to accelerate product cycles.
