PayPal Shares Soar Most On Record After “Chat To Checkout” Deal With OpenAI 

PayPal shares in New York jumped the most on record in premarket trading after the online payment processor announced a new deal with chatbot maker OpenAI to integrate its digital wallet directly into ChatGPT. The new payment feature is expected to make chat-to-checkout transactions seamless within ChatGPT.

A news release from PayPal unveiled plans to adopt the Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP) to enable instant payments and commerce within ChatGPT via PayPal’s digital wallet. The integration allows tens of millions of ChatGPT users to check out instantly with PayPal, while also enabling merchants to process payments through OpenAI Instant Checkout.

“By partnering with OpenAI and adopting the Agentic Commerce Protocol, PayPal will power payments and commerce experiences that help people go from chat to checkout in just a few taps for our joint customer bases,” CEO Alex Chriss said in the statement.

Chriss noted, “Hundreds of millions of people turn to ChatGPT each week for help with everyday tasks, including finding products they love, and over 400 million use PayPal to shop.”

Highlights of the new chat-to-checkout transactions:

• Merchant Integration: Starting in 2026, PayPal will bring millions of product listings from small businesses and global brands across categories like apparel, beauty, and electronics into ChatGPT, enabling in-chat discovery and purchasing.

• Seamless Checkout: PayPal’s wallet will support bank, balance, and card funding options, along with buyer and seller protections, tracking, and dispute resolution.

• Backend Infrastructure: Through its ACP server, PayPal will handle merchant routing, payment validation, and orchestration globally—without requiring individual merchant integrations.

• AI Expansion: Beyond commerce, PayPal will deploy ChatGPT Enterprise for its 24,000 employees, integrate Codex tools for engineers, and expand use of OpenAI’s APIs to speed product development and improve customer experiences.

News of the PayPal-OpenAI partnership sent shares of the payment processor in New York soaring, up more than 16%.

If these gains hold into the cash session, this would be the largest intraday gain on record since shares began trading in July 2015.

Just what the consumer needs: chat-to-checkout transactions…