Baird Managing Director of Internet Research Colin Sebastian: What Wall St. Thinks About Agentic Commerce

This week Scot goes on a markets deep dive with one of Wall Street's leading internet analysts. It’s a tour through the mega-cap playbook (Meta, Amazon, Google, eBay, Shopify) and how professional investors are actually pricing the agentic-commerce shift. Colin covers over $12 trillion of market cap across five names alone, so this is the view from the models, the channel checks, and the trading desk.

This is a wide-ranging, numbers-forward conversation about where the money moves as agents become the buyers and which companies Wall Street thinks come out ahead. 

Highlights:

• 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗣𝗘𝗘𝗗 𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸: Baird’s formula for internet winners: Scale, Product, Engineering, Efficiency, and Data. Nail all five, and the competitive advantage compounds.
• “𝗟𝗲𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗱𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗮𝗹𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴”: Colin explains why skeptics are dramatically underestimating the size of the opportunity.
• 𝗠𝗲𝘁𝗮 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿’𝘀 𝘁𝗼𝗽 𝗽𝗶𝗰𝗸: Colin’s highest-conviction AI bet is Meta driven by WhatsApp business agents, Meta AI, and unmatched consumer reach. (Last year’s pick: Google.)
• 𝗠𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗹𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗶𝘁𝘆: The real value won’t live in foundation models, it accrues to the platforms, applications, and distribution layers built on top.
• 𝗔𝗺𝗮𝘇𝗼𝗻’𝘀 𝗼𝗻𝗲-𝘄𝗮𝘆 𝗱𝗼𝗼𝗿: By opening its catalog to AI agents, Amazon may have crossed a line it can’t reverse and that could strengthen its ecosystem even further.
• “𝗖𝗹𝗼𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗲𝘆𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗯𝗼𝗮𝗿𝗱𝘀”: If AI agents skip search results and category pages, they also skip the ads, putting pressure on retail media’s biggest revenue stream.
• 𝗪𝗵𝗼 𝗼𝘄𝗻𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗮𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘀𝘂𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗶𝗻𝘀: The long-term winners will control identity, payments, checkout, and fulfillment, not just discovery.
• 𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗪𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗻𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗼𝘂𝘀 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗳𝘆: AI could bypass storefronts and even Shop Pay. That uncertainty alone is enough for investors to discount the stock.
• “𝗪𝗲’𝗹𝗹 𝘀𝗲𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗱𝗮𝘆”: Colin expects agentic commerce adoption to meaningfully accelerate after Q4, even a one- or two-point lift on today’s numbers would be significant.

Colin is one of the sharpest lenses out there on how the market is actually pricing all of this. Enjoy the conversation!

Timestamps:

3:28 Meet Colin Sebastian
5:04 20 years of history & the Wall Street event
7:00 From bartender to Baird
7:56 Baird's coverage universe & "TMT"
9:29 The GTA VI mega-launch call
11:12 Buy side vs. sell side, explained
13:52 The SPEED framework & top picks
16:16 What is agentic commerce?
20:05 Sizing it: trillions & consumer surveys
22:42 Meta's social-graph advantage
25:05 Amazon's walled garden & the one-way door
29:40 Google, UCP & why models get commoditized
32:36 eBay's used-goods moat
39:44 Retail media networks at risk?
44:33 OpenAI, ads & the closed-loop logic
48:36 Payments: PayPal, stablecoins & who wins
51:57 Protocols: UCP vs. ACP
52:23 Why Wall Street is nervous about Shopify

👉 Connect with Colin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cosebastian/
👉 Learn more about Baird: https://www.rwbaird.com/

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