Trends and insights 5 big takeaways from Visa Payments Forum Americas

Thousands of Visa clients and partners from over 40 countries gathered in Dallas for Visa Payments Forum (VPF) 2025 to explore what’s next in the world of payments. From AI-powered commerce to breakthroughs in fraud prevention, here are five insights that were top of mind for VPF attendees.

1. AI agents are the future of shopping

Using AI to drive more personalized, secure commerce, dominated conversations this year. AI agents, for example, can ease the mental load of online shopping by handling everything from product discovery to decision-making – all with consumer control and consent.

“AI agents can deliver an objectively better end-to-end discovery shopping and buying experience in almost every single dimension,” said Jack Forestell, Chief Product and Strategy Officer at Visa. “They have the potential to completely remove the time-consuming and often frustrating cognitive burden that comes with online shopping.”

Visa Intelligent Commerce empowers AI agents to support consumers through every stage of the shopping experience — from finding the perfect product to managing delivery to handling returns.

“It kind of feels like when e-commerce first started,” said Wade Arnold, CEO of Moov, a payment processing platform and Visa fintech partner. “We’re at the same tipping point with AI agents.”

2. Fraud prevention must be a priority

As commerce continues to move online, fraud is following. New technology is being leveraged by bad actors to find vulnerabilities during this rapid shift -- but Visa is staying ahead.

“Optimizing existing transactions comes down to one simple north star — making the card-not-present space as seamless and secure as the card present space,” said Visa Regional President of North America Kim Lawrence.

Visa’s Tap to Add Card allows users to add their Visa credit or debit cards to mobile wallets by simply tapping the card to their phone — no manual entry needed. It is part of a broader fraud strategy that includes tokenization and passkeys to protect consumers and boost merchant approval rates.

“Our payments team works closely with Visa on tokenization,” said Catherine Hogan, chief business officer, Card and Connected Commerce at Chase. “We know that it is the future. It’s a way to make transactions safer and more secure, so we’re really leaning in there.”

Velera, a credit union service organization and fintech solutions provider, currently offers Tap to Add Card to its credit union clients. “I think it’s a really cool innovation,” said Chuck Fagan, president and CEO of Velera. “Fraud is an area where we’re not competing against other financial institutions. We’re competing against the fraudster,” he added.

3. Flexibility is key to meeting evolving customer needs

Visa Flexible Credential is a network capability that allows multiple payment experiences - such as debit, prepaid, credit and rewards – to be accessed from a single card.

“At VPF, we are looking into which products we can enable for Visa, such as Visa Flex Credential,” said Peter Ternus, senior vice president of sales at BPC, a payments processor. BPC is one of the processors helping bring Visa Flex to market, with its first customer going live in Asia Pacific this June.

4. Money movement is becoming frictionless

For simplifying P2P payments, Visa and Samsung have teamed up to introduce Tap to Transfer¹ in the U.S., a first-of-its-kind feature for Samsung Wallet. Powered by Visa’s Tap technology and Visa Direct real-time² solution platform, Tap to Transfer lets Samsung Galaxy users send money to friends and family instantly by tapping their phones together or by tapping a participating contactless debit card — no app navigation, no manual card entry, no wait times or hassle if a friend doesn’t have the same P2P app.

“The future of payments is about simplicity and speed, and Tap to Transfer delivers both,” said Robert Clayton, VP of product management at global fintech Fiserv. “We’re proud to help enable the kind of seamless connectivity that allows trusted partners like Visa and Samsung to bring new real-time payment experiences to life.”

Chris Ruppel, interim president at Green Dot agreed: “Consumers expect fast, intuitive ways to move money in the moment. By working alongside leaders like Visa and Samsung, we’re helping expand access to smarter P2P options that fit today’s digital lifestyles.”

5. Innovation and services keep businesses future-ready

Innovation thrives through collaboration. That’s the approach behind Visa’s evolving role — not just as a payments network, but as a provider of services.

With over 200 products and solutions, Visa’s Value-Added Services (VAS) are designed to help clients stay competitive, tackle new challenges, and unlock growth.

“We created our value-added services business so we can take on the day-to-day complexity of payments,” said Lawrence in her VPF keynote. “This frees you to invest, innovate and differentiate your business.”

Scott Manderson of TD Bank, Canada, an exclusive issuer of Visa cards, shared how TD Bank has leveraged Visa’s Marketing Services to host a small business event two years in a row.

“Visa Marketing Services was truly plug and play for us to be able to organize and host an event for more than 100 female entrepreneurs in Toronto,” he said. “Feedback was amazing from clients, and we’re hopeful to do it again for a third year.”

A key driver of VAS is Visa Consulting and Analytics, which combines learnings from client engagements with intelligence from VisaNet data to help businesses identify emerging trends and act quickly and strategically.

“In today’s world, the vast amount of data that Visa has helps us understand customer trends, how we’re doing in our sector, and where spend is shifting — both discretionary and non-discretionary — across the globe,” said Leeny Oberg, CFO & Executive VP of Development at Marriott International. “Benefiting from Visa data helps us do a lot more for our customers.”

1. Requires a contactless and payments transaction-enabled Visa debit card from a participating U.S. bank. Fees and limits apply. Your financial institution or mobile carrier may charge you. See Samsung.com for details.
2. Actual fund availability for all Visa Direct transactions may depend on receiving financial institution, account type, region, compliance processes, along with other factors, as applicable.