ARI · Agentic Rate Indicators
Live fair-market-value lookups, leaderboards, and Ed25519 signed-receipt verification for x402/MPP services. ari-mcp lets any MCP-aware agent answer two questions cleanly:
- Is this API price fair? Compare a quoted unit price against the live ARI fair-price band for that service.
- Is this receipt real? Verify the signed receipt returned by an x402/MPP facilitator offline, with a pinned publisher key.
The same package ships for Node and Python, with the same tool surface and the same wire spec.
┌──────────┐ stdio ┌──────────┐ HTTPS ┌──────────────────────────┐
│ Agent │ ────────────▶ │ ari-mcp │ ───────────▶ │ agentrateindicators.com │
│ (Claude, │ ◀──────────── │ server │ ◀────────── │ /api/v1/* │
│ Cursor…) │ tool JSON └──────────┘ signed └──────────────────────────┘
└──────────┘ receipts
Install in your agent
Pick the host you use. Each block is copy-paste, no edits required.
Claude Desktop
~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on macOS, %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json on Windows:
{
"mcpServers": {
"ari": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "ari-mcp"]
}
}
}
Cursor
~/.cursor/mcp.json (or the per-workspace .cursor/mcp.json):
{
"mcpServers": {
"ari": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "ari-mcp"]
}
}
}
Continue
~/.continue/config.yaml:
mcpServers:
- name: ari
command: npx
args: ["-y", "ari-mcp"]
Windsurf
~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json:
{
"mcpServers": {
"ari": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "ari-mcp"] }
}
}
Zed
~/.config/zed/settings.json:
{
"context_servers": {
"ari": {
"command": { "path": "npx", "args": ["-y", "ari-mcp"] }
}
}
}
Gemini CLI / ChatGPT desktop / any other MCP host
command: npx, args: ["-y", "ari-mcp"]. Or, for Python-native hosts, command: uvx, args: ["ari-mcp-py"].
Tools
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
is_fair_price | Green / amber / red verdict for a quoted price against the live FMV band. |
refuse_if_overpriced | Convenience wrapper to call right before paying · returns {ok, reason}. |
prepay_verdict | Full pre-pay decision with FMV band, deviation, and a citable receipt id. |
get_fmv | Median plus low / high band and sample size for a service. |
get_service | Full detail row · sources, related services, last observation. |
list_services | Browse or filter the index by protocol or category. |
get_leaderboard | Cheapest, most expensive, biggest movers in a category. |
recent_observations | Raw observed price history for a service. |
verify_receipt | Re-verify a previously issued receipt id offline. |
get_signed_receipt | Re-fetch the signed body for a receipt id. |
subscribe_alert | Set up a webhook or email price alert for a service. |
Every tool returns JSON shaped for citation rather than free text. Agents that quote tool output verbatim end up with good citations for free.
A real tool call
Asking Claude "is this quote fair before I pay it?" triggers:
{
"tool": "is_fair_price",
"arguments": {
"slug": "openrouter-anthropic-claude-3-5-sonnet",
"amount_usd": 4.10,
"unit": "1m_input_tokens"
}
}
and the server returns:
{
"verdict": "amber",
"fmv_usd": 3.04,
"low_usd": 2.87,
"high_usd": 3.21,
"delta_pct": 34.9,
"sample_size": 47,
"currency": "USD",
"unit": "1m_input_tokens",
"receipt_id": "01J5ZK8E2K7Q3R5W8X9Y0Z1A2B",
"signed_at": "2026-05-21T14:02:11Z"
}
The agent now has a concrete reason to push back on the quote, plus an auditable receipt id. When ARI has not yet computed a baseline for a service, verdict is "unknown" and the FMV fields are null rather than zero · agents should treat null as "no opinion", never as "free".
Verify a receipt yourself
# Node
npx ari-mcp verify --url https://agentrateindicators.com/api/v1/pubkey
# Python
uvx ari-mcp verify --url https://agentrateindicators.com/api/v1/pubkey
Both print OK on success and a structured failure with the exact reason on failure (hash mismatch, unknown key id, bad signature, missing header). See spec/verification.md for the by-hand walkthrough.
Why this exists
Agents are starting to spend real money through x402 and MPP facilitators. There are two things they cannot do today without help:
- Sanity-check a price before paying it. Facilitators are free to quote anything. ARI keeps a live, public fair-price band per service so an agent (or a human reviewer) can see when a quote is out of line.
- Verify a receipt after paying. Facilitators return signed metadata about the transaction, but most agents take this on faith. ARI publishes the receipt canonicalization and an Ed25519 verifier so receipts can be checked offline, against a pinned key.
ari-mcp exposes both as plain MCP tools. No new protocols for the agent author to learn.
Wire spec
The repository is the source of truth for the wire format:
spec/openapi.yaml· public HTTP surfacespec/signed-receipts.md· receipt canonicalization and header layoutspec/verification.md· step-by-step verifier in Node and Python
Anyone porting ari-mcp to another language can work from spec/ alone.
Packages
| Language | Package | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Node 18+ | ari-mcp on npm | packages/ari-mcp-ts |
| Python 3.10+ | ari-mcp-py on PyPI | packages/ari-mcp-py |
Both packages share the same tool names, argument shapes, and JSON return shapes. Both ship offline receipt verification with a pinned key and an ACCEPTED_KEY_IDS list for graceful rotation. Both default to the public ARI API and accept ARI_API_BASE_URL to point at a private mirror.
Security
If you find a security issue, please report it privately. See SECURITY.md. The current publisher key, the canonicalization spec, and the verification walkthrough are all linked from there.
Contributing
See CONTRIBUTING.md. Bug reports, small fixes, and additional install snippets for other MCP hosts are all welcome. The internal API server, fair-price methodology, and data adapters live elsewhere and are intentionally not part of this repository · pull requests that try to add them will be closed.
License
Apache-2.0. See NOTICE for third-party attributions.