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AI Just Put Software Fees and Payment Fees on Notice

Silicon Scoop · August 5, 2026

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With Craig Major and Jon Irwin

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AI Just Put Software Fees and Payment Fees on Notice

AI Stock Selloff: How One Thought Experiment Shook the Entire Market

Estimated reading time: 10 minutes

Key Takeaways

  • In February 2026, a single Substack post triggered one of the most talked-about AI stock selloffs in recent memory.
  • The post described a fictional but deeply researched scenario called “The 2028 Global Intelligence Crisis.”
  • Stock markets reacted violently across software, payments, and fintech sectors.
  • Analysts had started calling February 2026 the SaaSpocalypse — a wave of selling pressure across Software-as-a-Service companies.
  • The most underreported part of the Citrini scenario is the threat to agentic commerce and traditional payment rails.

Table of contents

A Substack Post Just Wiped Out Hundreds of Billions in Market Value

In February 2026, a single Substack post triggered one of the most talked-about AI stock selloffs in recent memory.

Not a government report. Not a Fed announcement. A thought experiment.

The post, published by analysis firm Citrini Research, described a fictional but deeply researched scenario called “The 2028 Global Intelligence Crisis.” Within hours of it going live, stock markets reacted violently across software, payments, and fintech sectors.

This blog breaks down exactly what happened, why investors panicked, and what the long-term signals actually mean for businesses and markets.

—

Section 1: The Thought Experiment That Moved Markets — “The 2028 Global Intelligence Crisis”

Citrini Research published their macro memo in February 2026. The piece was framed clearly as a scenario analysis, not a forecast. But the detail and logic inside it were enough to rattle investor confidence across multiple sectors.

What the Scenario Described

The hypothetical is set in June 2028. Here is what it projects:

  • U.S. unemployment hits 10.2% driven by mass white-collar layoffs beginning in early 2026
  • GDP growth remains strong on paper, but a dangerous gap opens between output and real income
  • A concept called “ghost GDP” emerges — output that shows up in national accounts but never circulates through the real economy
  • Consumer spending collapses as a negative feedback loop takes hold
  • The S&P 500 suffers a peak-to-trough crash of 38%

The feedback loop the authors describe is chilling in its simplicity:

> “AI capabilities improved, companies needed fewer workers, white collar layoffs increased, displaced workers spent less, margin pressure pushed firms to invest more in AI, AI capabilities improved.”

What AI Disrupts in This Scenario

The Citrini model does not stop at software. It maps out a chain reaction:

  • AI disrupts software → software-backed loan defaults follow
  • Vibe coding and AI agents create dozens of overnight alternatives to services like DoorDash
  • Agentic commerce, paired with stablecoins, eliminates transaction fees and destroys the business models of payment processors

The authors were careful to call it a scenario, writing: “What follows is a scenario, not a prediction. Hopefully, reading this leaves you more prepared for potential left tail risks as AI makes the economy increasingly weird.”

Despite that disclaimer, markets did not stay calm.

Citrini Research scenario

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Section 2: Software Stocks and the SaaSpocalypse — How AI Crashed the Market

The software stocks were already struggling before the Citrini post landed.

February 2026 had already been brutal. Analysts had started calling it the SaaSpocalypse — a wave of selling pressure across Software-as-a-Service companies driven by growing fear that AI would make traditional software purchases unnecessary.

What Triggered the February Selloff

The selloff had already begun earlier in the month. Scared investors were largely citing the release of new AI capabilities inside Anthropic’s AI work companion, Claude Cowork, as the trigger. The fear was direct: if AI can do what the software does, why pay for the software?

Reuters reported that approximately $830 billion in software market value was erased in a single six-day stretch in early February 2026. That is not a rounding error. That is real money leaving real companies.

Which Companies Were Hit

After the Citrini post, the damage spread even further:

  • ServiceNow and other SaaS platforms slid deeper into losses
  • DoorDash and Uber dropped as investors processed the vibe-coding delivery app scenario
  • Mastercard, Visa, American Express, Capital One fell as agentic commerce fears grew
  • Blackstone and KKR were also caught in the wave

James St. Aubin, Chief Investment Officer at Ocean Park Asset Management, captured the mood precisely:

> “The seemingly wide moats of these companies feel a lot more narrow today as competition from AI-created products intensifies. Perhaps this is an overreaction, but the threat is real and valuations must account for that. My biggest fear is that this is a canary in the coal mine for the labor market.”

Reuters report

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—

Section 3: Agentic Commerce and Stablecoins — The Real Threat to Payments

The most underreported part of the Citrini scenario is the threat to agentic commerce and traditional payment rails.

Most headlines focused on software. But the deeper market read is about what AI-powered agents could do to transaction-based business models.

What Is Agentic Commerce?

Agentic commerce is when AI systems act on behalf of users to search, compare, select, check out, and complete purchases — all without the human clicking a single button.

These AI agents operate with delegated authority. That means they can transact using your preferences, your budget rules, and your accounts — autonomously.

This is not a distant concept. Fenwick’s 2026 analysis states that 2026 is a pivotal year for agentic payments because AI systems can already perform this entire transaction cycle today.

New payment protocols — including AP2, x402, and MPP — are being developed specifically to support machine-to-machine transactions at scale.

Why Stablecoins Amplify the Risk

The Citrini scenario pairs agentic commerce with stablecoins — digital currencies pegged to stable assets like the U.S. dollar.

Here is why that combination matters:

  • Stablecoins allow near-instant, low-cost settlement without traditional banking rails
  • When AI agents transact using stablecoins, card networks become optional
  • Transaction fees — the revenue backbone of Mastercard, Visa, and Amex — can be compressed toward zero

Visa’s 2026 outlook acknowledges that agentic commerce is moving mainstream and directly ties stablecoin momentum to the U.S. GENIUS Act, which establishes a regulatory framework for digital payment assets.

How Big Is This Market?

Juniper Research projects that agentic commerce spend could reach $1.5 trillion globally by 2030.

The top barrier to deployment is not technology. It is trust — specifically, whether AI agents can transact safely, prove consent, and resolve disputes at scale.

Legal and compliance experts note this creates significant new risks for businesses:

  • Who is liable when an AI agent makes a bad purchase decision?
  • How do you prove consent in a machine-initiated transaction?
  • What fraud protections apply when no human clicked “confirm”?

These are not theoretical questions. They are the compliance challenges that legal teams are working through right now.

Fenwick analysis

NASCUS compliance risks

Juniper Research projection

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Section 4: Expert Opinions on AI Disruption — Is the Market Overreacting?

Not everyone believes the panic is justified.

Experts across finance and technology are pushing back on the idea that AI will immediately and completely dismantle software demand. The nuance matters here.

The Case That the Selloff Is Overdone

Several prominent analysts have called the software selloff “illogical” and “overdone.” Their core argument:

  • Better AI tools create demand for more software, not less
  • AI lowers the cost to build applications, which expands the total market
  • Most businesses cannot simply “vibe code” their way to enterprise-grade solutions

Morningstar equity market strategist Lochlan Halloway summed up the contradiction perfectly:

> “It seems like markets found a reason to be worried about too little AI and too much AI at the same time.”

This is the central irony of the current moment. Investors are simultaneously:

1. Selling software stocks because AI might make them irrelevant

2. Getting nervous about the enormous capital spending commitments AI companies are making

The AGI Timeline Debate

A key factor feeding market fear is the race among tech leaders to claim AGI — Artificial General Intelligence — is right around the corner.

Elon Musk, Dario Amodei, and Sam Altman have all claimed AGI could arrive within 2 to 4 years. But a November 2025 survey of industry leaders found that the average expert disagreed with that timeline.

The unpredictability of these projections is not new. Former OpenAI employee Daniel Kokotajlo published a widely shared report in early 2025 predicting a rapid path to superintelligence. By January 2026, he had already walked back his claims, saying development was moving slower than he anticipated.

The Real Signal vs. The Noise

The more measured read from analysts and legal experts suggests:

  • Real disruption risk exists — this is not all noise
  • Immediate collapse of software demand is unlikely
  • Agentic commerce and stablecoin rails represent the more credible long-term threat to payments companies
  • The selloff is partly rational repricing and partly contagious fear

Reuters report

—

Section 5: What This Means for Businesses — Preparing for an AI-Driven Economy

Whether the Citrini scenario plays out in 2028 or 2038, the direction of travel is clear.

AI is getting better at performing tasks that previously required human workers or specialized software subscriptions.

What Forward-Thinking Businesses Are Doing Now

  • Auditing their software stack to identify which tools AI can already replace or enhance
  • Automating repetitive internal workflows to reduce headcount dependency on manual tasks
  • Exploring agentic commerce readiness — understanding how AI purchasing agents may interact with their storefronts
  • Monitoring stablecoin regulation through frameworks like the GENIUS Act, which may reshape payment processing within a few years
  • Building automation into operations before labor cost pressure forces reactive decisions

The businesses that treat AI disruption as a reason to panic are making the same mistake as the investors selling off blindly. The smarter response is preparation and deliberate automation.

The Ghost GDP Problem Is Real — Even If 2028 Is Not

The “ghost GDP” concept in the Citrini scenario is worth taking seriously regardless of timeline.

If AI generates productivity gains that flow entirely to corporate margins without circulating back to workers through wages, consumer demand weakens. That weakens the revenue base for every business selling to consumers.

This is not a fringe concern. It is a structural risk that economists and policymakers are beginning to debate seriously.

—

FAQ: AI Stock Selloff, Agentic Commerce, and Market Disruption

1. What caused the AI stock selloff in February 2026?
The selloff was triggered by a combination of Anthropic releasing powerful new AI capabilities through Claude Cowork and the publication of Citrini Research’s “2028 Global Intelligence Crisis” scenario on Substack. These two events amplified existing negative sentiment in software stocks.

2. What is the “2028 Global Intelligence Crisis” scenario?
It is a macro memo published by Citrini Research in February 2026. It describes a fictional but detailed future in which AI-driven white-collar unemployment pushes U.S. joblessness to 10.2%, creates a “ghost GDP” dynamic, and causes a 38% peak-to-trough crash in the S&P 500. It is a scenario analysis, not a prediction.

3. What is “ghost GDP” and why does it matter?
Ghost GDP refers to economic output that shows up in national accounts — like GDP numbers — but never circulates through the real economy as wages or consumer spending. It matters because strong GDP numbers could mask serious damage to household finances and consumer demand.

4. Which stocks were hit hardest by the selloff?
Software companies like ServiceNow suffered significant losses. Delivery platforms like DoorDash and Uber also fell. Payment companies including Mastercard, Visa, American Express, and Capital One dropped as fears about agentic commerce spread.

5. What is agentic commerce?
Agentic commerce is when AI systems act on behalf of users to search, compare, select, and complete purchases autonomously — without direct human input at each step. AI agents use delegated authority to transact on your behalf.

6. How do stablecoins threaten payment processors like Visa and Mastercard?
Stablecoins allow near-instant, low-cost transfers that bypass traditional card networks. If AI agents begin using stablecoins to complete transactions, the transaction fees that Visa, Mastercard, and American Express depend on could be severely compressed or eliminated.

7. How big is the agentic commerce market expected to get?
Juniper Research projects agentic commerce spend could reach $1.5 trillion globally by 2030. The biggest barrier to that growth is not technology — it is trust, consent verification, and compliance infrastructure.

8. Is the market reaction to AI overdone?
Many analysts believe yes. Experts including Morningstar strategists and tech industry commentators argue that improving AI capability tends to increase demand for software rather than kill it. However, they acknowledge real disruption risk exists, particularly in payments and transaction-based business models.

9. When will AGI actually arrive?
Nobody agrees. Tech leaders like Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and Dario Amodei claim AGI could arrive within 2 to 4 years. A November 2025 survey of broader industry experts found most disagreed with that timeline. The AGI timeline has also been revised before — notably by former OpenAI researcher Daniel Kokotajlo, who walked back his earlier projections in January 2026.

10. What should businesses do to prepare for AI-driven disruption?
Businesses should audit their software and workflow dependencies, begin automating repetitive internal processes now, monitor agentic commerce developments, stay informed on stablecoin regulation, and build resilience into their operations before disruption forces reactive decisions. The goal is to be ahead of the shift, not caught by it.

Sources: Citrini Research, Reuters, Fenwick, NASCUS, Juniper Research

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Episode transcript

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Craig: a viral substack post just wiped out over 80 oh, sorry. 800,000,000,000 from tech market by predicting an artificial intelligence saas pocalypse. if you think your software subscription and credit card points are safe, wall street's massive panic proves the entire digital economy is about to be rewritten. so this ai triggers a wall street saas pocalypse, a highly detailed macroeconomic thought experiment by citrini research paired with anthropic's powerful cloud co work released as released sparked a massive sell off across software, fintech, and payment sectors. investors are panicking that autonomous ai agents using stablecoins will entirely bypass credit card network and make traditional softwares as a service business models completely obsolete. this directly threatens the multibillion dollar transaction fee revenue models of giants like visa, mastercard, servicenow, and accelerating a structural shift towards an automated machine to machine economy. and this might be the thing that starts, the cryptocurrency stablecoin, revolution accelerating to the next level. what do you think about this, john?

Jon: i thought this was really cool, and super, super scary. but let's talk about kind of a few things that it touched on. so the first one was the death of the middleman, which was that ai agents may eliminate intermediaries. so today, companies like doordash, uber, expedia, they earn money by connecting parties together and taking a percentage of transactions. and so what this report argued was that future ai systems could negotiate, they could purchase, they could book, and they could coordinate services directly. so if ai agents transact with each other, many of the existing, we'll call them, toll booth businesses could lose their economic moat. and so investors immediately started questioning whether these business models remain viable in a highly agentic ai future. the next one was this white collar job displacement, which the scenario had imagined unemployment exceeding 10% as ai rapidly automate. so we're talking analysts, accountants, programmers, customer service workers, legal researchers, consultants, and and administrative staff. so, historically, automation displaced manual labor first. and so the ai revolution is unusual because it targets cognitive labor. and so this is why some economists believe that ai could create a very different transition than prior industrial revolutions. one of the more intellectual, ideas from the report was this ghost gdp. and so the theory suggested that ai could increase productive output while reducing the number of economic transactions. so for example, one ai replaces 10 analysts. productivity rises. salaries disappear. consumer spending falls. so traditional gdp metrics might still show economic activity occurring, but the wealth distribution mechanism breaks down. so there are a lot of cool but scary things that, to me, seem possible. what about you?

Craig: well, it's beyond possible. as you know

Jon: i used the wrong word.

Craig: that's all i know. i just as you know, i run opencloud toronto, and i deal with builders all the time. and i even judged a couple of weeks ago, one of our regulars come out, and they have, x four zero three payment gateway for agents where you give your agents credits and they buy whatever they need at the time. and it's on, whatever network it has to be on so they can go and you give it a wallet and whatnot. so if they need api calls, they can just pay for them at the time and off you go. we're moving to that. we're moving to an agent first web, and as a result, the agent's payment is gonna be a high priority from moving forward, and they'll take care of the hassle. they'll take care of the hassle of all the back end stuff that the average consumer doesn't understand when it comes to these payment gateways. so that'll change things. it'll slowly quickly become an invisible tech where you'll have your agent will have a wall. you'll see this stuff happen. it'll, like, either ask you for approval or have predetermined approval, and off you go. it has to happen. and, you know, we're now moving to web four or whatever we're gonna call. like i said, the agent first web. we've we've talked about before this for startup fest, they have a ai agent. your ai agents can talk to you to book, conference rooms, to book places to meet, to book all sorts of stuff so that your ai agent can talk to the conference, ai agent to talk to everyone else's ai agent so that you can get your calendar fully booked. tell me we're not at an ai first web when that stuff is what's happening.

Jon: yeah. yeah. that kind of blew me away. so, i'm going to start up in montreal in july. and, this, what it does is it registers. it builds presence. it works the room. it returns with reasons and recommendations and sets up meetings, and and it does everything an assistant would do but more, which i'm excited to test out to see how it does. called, it's called envoy in french, but those that are english speaking, envoy, e n v o i. it's really cool.

Craig: here, if anybody wants to take a look, and, we'll get back to our article in a minute because it's that was really just a side, hustle or it's not hustle, a side jaunt about this whole ai agent and yeah. we're just kicking out. this, think of this update like upgrading a congested highway toll road to an instant free teleporter. right now, every time you buy something online, your money passes through corporate toll booths like visa, mastercard, which pocket a percentage of the fee, while the platform software platforms you charge a hefty monthly subscription just to manage the paperwork. this paradigm means your personal ai system bypasses the toll roll entirely, instantly teleporting digital currency straight to the vendor for zero fees while building its own software on the fly. so this has to happen, you know, whether it's, you know, this technology or whatever. but the concept we're moving towards is a cost free micropayment digital wallet for your ai agent. just think of it like tap and pay. you give it so much, and it's allowed to do kinda what it wants, and it gives you a report, and you'd set up the approvals and what. it has to happen because like, let's face it. every time there's a demo, hey. have ai book your travel arrangements. have ai book this. well, how can it do that without payment?

Jon: yeah.

Craig: and so the question becomes the mastercard, visa, they're scrambling because they don't really have the structure to handle this properly by limiting your agent preapproval, all that kind of stuff or in line approval. your agent wants to buy something, you know, you just tap yes or what have you. it doesn't have the infrastructure for that, but other things do. and start ups and ai are moving faster than the banks and credit cards can move. doesn't mean what's gonna happen here is the credit cards and the banks will buy these gateways, these companies that produce these, payment gateways, these ai agent, payment tools, and they'll just still take a percentage of the fee, but just add a small level because that's just what's gonna happen. they won't move fast enough, but they have enough money to buy whoever, is moving fast enough. so we'll see how that hap works out.

Jon: yeah. i hope they don't sell to these credit card companies. i hope that we get this just another option to circumvent credit card companies. but, again, probably won't, but that's just my, that's my hope. but, so, the story here is it just goes to show that investors were already nervous about this ai stuff. and so, like, let's just let's let's be let's be serious here. a single essay doesn't erase hundreds of billions of dollars in market value unless investors are already questioning their assumptions. right? absolutely. like, it's not like, this, like, just, like, came out of nowhere and investors spooked. no. they were already spooked. so, the thing is traditional markets, they would traditionally respond to earnings, interest rates, inflation, geopolitics. but now what's scary is that narratives are becoming market moving events, which scares the crap out of me because people can generate this stuff with ai.

Craig: yeah. and this is happening now, with the agentic market spending projected to hit mass markets by 2030. like, two weeks ago, i judged not a pitch competition, but an agentic ai builds competition, specifically, implementing x four zero two payment gateways for agent payments. and there's a bunch of apps, competing, and it's great. like, this stuff is happening now. free to alter low cost transact transactional architecture designed to strip strip away the hidden 1.5 to 3.5% processing fees currently baked into consumer products. so your personal ai agent can autonomously purchase and manage your software apps or delivery orders behind the scenes without you ever pulling out a credit card or clicking the payment industry until the payment industry buys this industry out.

Jon: yeah. yeah. the the there's so much that's going to happen and changes that are going to happen, and things are gonna happen so fast in the next five, two, three, five years even. that is, it's gonna blow us away. it's gonna blow my mind, and, things are gonna be changing drastically. not to be a conspiracy theorist or a doomsday person, but it's crap's happening fast. yeah. i wouldn't say it's doomsday.

Craig: it's just that the world is changing very, very fast. like, every time we talk about quantum encryption is coming closer and closer to it all being cracked. so, you know, who's gonna move faster on this? mastercard, visa, or these agent ai x four zero two encryption gateways? you know, what are you gonna trust for the future? i think the world is really, really changing. and juniper research projects the agent to commerce could reach 1,500,000,000,000 globally by 2030. so ai is rapidly turning software from a product you buy on autonomous employee direct, threatening to shatter legacy payment networks and subscription fees along all the way. are you ready to hand over your keys to let an ai agent spend your real money completely on auto autopilot, or are you keeping your hand firmly on your wallet? let us know in the chat. we'd love to hear from you.

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