---
type: Article
name: "What is Folio?"
id: "https://selfe.ai/insights/glossary/what-is-folio"
url: "https://selfe.ai/insights/glossary/what-is-folio"
publisher: "did:web:selfe.ai"
description: "Selfe's payment layer, the part that confirms an AI agent is authorised to spend on someone's behalf and settles the transaction with the business once it does."
datePublished: "2026-09-15T16:25:20.643Z"
author: The Selfe team
---

# What is Folio?

> Selfe's payment layer, the part that confirms an AI agent is authorised to spend on someone's behalf and settles the transaction with the business once it does.

## In short

- Folio is Selfe's payment layer: it checks an agent's spend authorisation and settles the resulting sale.
- It pays out through a business's existing systems, not a separate one it has to adopt.

Good for: Settling a transaction once everything before it has already checked out. Not good for: Doing any of the checking itself, that happens earlier in the chain, identity and authorisation first.

It sits at the end of the chain, after a business has been found, understood and trusted. An agent presenting a spend authorisation still needs that authorisation checked and the resulting sale paid out to the business, on the business's existing systems, not a new set it has to learn. Folio is the part of Selfe doing that checking and settling.

## Good for

Settling a transaction once everything before it has already checked out.

## Not good for

Doing any of the checking itself, that happens earlier in the chain, identity and authorisation first.

## Act on this

- [Check whether an agent can buy from you](https://selfe.ai/agentic-commerce/buyability-check) — the free readiness scan.
- [Discover venues](https://selfe.ai/api/registry/discover) — `POST`, semantic browse across the registry.
- [Match a bookable answer](https://selfe.ai/api/registry/match) — `POST` with dates and party size.
- [Verify Selfe's identity](https://selfe.ai/.well-known/did.json) — `did:web:selfe.ai`.
- [Agent card](https://selfe.ai/.well-known/agent-card.json) — how to connect over A2A or MCP.