How it makes money
Four lines, in order of how soon they arrive:1
Platform fee on settled volume
Charged to the merchant. Deliberately below typical card acceptance cost — that is the entire commercial argument.
2
Spread on the payout conversion
The gap between the rate the partner gives and the rate the merchant is quoted. Shared with the disbursement partner.
3
Instant settlement
A fee for instant rather than nightly payout.
4
Lending against observed cashflow
Later. This is where acquiring businesses actually make money, and it is unlocked by owning the cashflow record, not by charging more.
The table
Thin per merchant and entirely normal for acquiring. The business is volume and retention, and the retention argument is specific: a merchant who has been paid on an afternoon the bank terminal was down does not go back.
The line the model contradicts
And the second, on the SKR premium:How the ledger books it
@nelo/settle accrues all four deductions on every settled sale, in one transaction, because it is one economic event — the money arrived, the fee was earned, the reserve was funded and the rebate accrued at the same instant. Splitting it would let three of the four land and the fourth fail.
On a $100 sale at the rates above:
The reserve and rebate are funded out of the platform’s own take, not charged on top of the merchant’s fee. After a full payout, what stays in custody is exactly the platform fee — and that fee has to cover the reserve and rebate promised out of it. At 50 bps fee against 20 + 10 bps promised, 20 bps is genuinely free. That relationship is a committed test.