Cloudflare on Thursday announced plans to introduce "NET Dollar," a new U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin, amid the expected emergence of autonomous, goal-driven artificial intelligence "agents" in e-commerce. Cloudflare stock, which rose a fraction on Thursday, has climbed 93% in 2025.
Stablecoins are cryptocurrency tokens intended to hold their value at a certain price point, usually $1, and are backed by another asset. The Genius Act, signed by President Donald Trump in July, is expected to boost the popularity of stablecoin currencies.
Tether is the largest stablecoin issuer, followed by Circle Internet Group. More payments companies are jumping on the stablecoin bandwagon, including PayPal Holdings.
Will AI Agents Take Off In E-Commerce?
Started in 2009, Cloudflare works to speed up and provide security for web applications routed through its intelligent global network.
Many tech companies are focused on autonomous, goal-driven AI "agents" that complete tasks on their own. One of the big applications is expected to be online shopping on the behalf of consumers. Also, Cloudflare aims to be a bigger player in e-commerce.
"The internet's next business model will be powered by pay-per-use, fractional payments, and microtransactions — tools that shift incentives toward original, creative content that actually adds value," said Matthew Prince, cofounder and chief executive of Cloudflare, in a news release. "By using our global network, we are going to help modernize the financial rails needed to move money at the speed of the internet, helping to create a more open and valuable internet for everyone."
Meanwhile, Google-parent Alphabet last week announced a new Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), developed with 60 industry partners including Mastercard, American Express, and PayPal. It targets secure commerce for AI agents and is backed up by cryptographically signed digital contracts.
On the stock market today, Cloudflare stock rose 0.3% to close at 218.20.
Cloudflare Stock: x402 Foundation
Further, Cloudflare has ties to generative artificial intelligence leader OpenAI. Cloudflare provides secure links to cloud services when consumers sign up to use ChatGPT. In addition, Cloudflare is a supporter of Anthropic's Model Context Protocol (MCP), which is a standardized process for connecting AI agents to external data sources and apps.
Moreover, Cloudflare has partnered with cryptocurrency firm Coinbase to create the x402 Foundation, stemming from the x402 protocol, which allows for direct transactions between machines as opposed to humans making payments.
"Often times, payments from machines aren't able to be made as website operators lack standardization of response code formatting and ability of response, preventing seamless payment as humans are often able," said KeyBanc Capital analyst Jackson Ader in a report. "The x402 transaction flow, developed by Coinbase, allows for users to have AI agents pay for browser sessions, assistants to purchase goods, and more."
Cloudflare Stock Technical Ratings
To protect their content, Cloudflare recently began giving web domains the option to block AI crawlers. Here's an in-depth look into Cloudflare's growth and road map based on an IBD interview with Prince.
In addition, Cloudflare stock owns a Composite Rating of 96 out of a best-possible 99, according to IBD Stock Checkup.
Meanwhile, Cloudflare stock holds an Accumulation/Distribution Rating of B-plus. That rating analyzes price and volume changes in a stock over the past 13 weeks of trading. (A+ signifies heavy institutional buying; E means heavy selling. Think of a C grade as neutral.)
Follow Reinhardt Krause on X, formerly Twitter, @reinhardtk_tech for updates on artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, quantum computing and cloud computing.
