Studio finance leads, product managers, and engineers all evaluate the Linq platform from different vocabularies. This glossary translates the common terms so demos do not stall on definitions.
The fee a card network (Visa, Mastercard) charges merchants on every card transaction. A portion of that fee is shared with the card issuer (the bank) and, in a co-branded program, a slice flows back to the program operator and the studio. Interchange is what funds the cashback and the studio revenue share.
One hundredth of a percent. 25 basis points = 0.25%. We quote interchange revenue share in bps because the absolute fee on a single transaction is small but the bps figure stays stable across ticket sizes. A 25 bps share on $400/month of card spend per holder = $1.00/month per holder back to the studio.
The count of unique players who launched the game at least once in a 30-day window. Linq's target customer band is 50,000 to 2,000,000 MAU - the segment with enough card-adoption base to justify the integration but small enough that off-the-shelf BaaS rather than in-house infrastructure is the right answer.
The identity verification process under United States banking regulations before opening a financial account. Linq runs KYC through Plaid, capturing full legal name, date of birth, address, and last four digits of SSN, then matching against authoritative data sources. Players complete KYC inside the game in roughly three minutes.
The business equivalent of KYC. Studios complete KYB during onboarding so the banking partner can verify the entity, beneficial owners, and operating jurisdiction before a co-branded card program is launched. Typically takes 7-10 business days.
The US federal statute that requires financial institutions to maintain anti-money-laundering programs, file suspicious activity reports, and screen against OFAC sanctions lists. BSA scope applies to the banking partner and, by extension, to program operators. Linq inherits BSA obligations relevant to program management; the banking partner runs the core compliance program.
A delivery model where a chartered bank exposes its core banking infrastructure (account opening, card issuing, ACH, debit rails) through APIs so that non-banks can launch financial products without holding a charter. Linq's co-branded card program runs on BaaS infrastructure; studios do not need a bank license.
A debit (or credit) card issued by a bank and marketed under a partner brand. The card carries the partner's name and art alongside the network logo (Visa or Mastercard). For Linq, the partner brand is Toffee, set up to feel native to gaming audiences while preserving the regulated banking relationship.
Cardholder funds at our banking partner are eligible for FDIC pass-through deposit insurance up to the standard limits (currently $250,000 per depositor). Players see this disclosure during card application.
The percentage of players from a starting group ("cohort") who are still active at day N. Day-30, day-60, and day-90 retention curves are the standard mobile gaming benchmark. Linq's analytics surface card-linked cohorts as a separate curve against a matched control built via propensity-score matching.
A statistical technique for building a control group when treatment assignment (here, opting in to a card) is not random. We estimate the probability of card adoption from pre-treatment features (session frequency, spend tier) and pair card holders with non-card holders at similar scores. The retention delta between matched cohorts is a defensible measure of card-program lift.
A reward rule fired by an in-game event. Studios configure triggers in the Linq dashboard - e.g. "on referral_completed, award 50 gems if cashback wallet balance > 0". The Unity plugin and Unreal REST plugin emit events; the Linq rules engine evaluates triggers in real time.
Games where players wager real currency on outcomes (online sportsbooks, casino apps, fantasy contests). RMG is regulated separately from general mobile gaming and falls outside Linq's program scope. Studios in the RMG category should work with specialized BaaS providers oriented to that regulatory regime.
The total revenue a single player generates across their entire lifecycle. In IAP-only mobile gaming, LTV cliffs steeply at day 90 because spending players churn. Adding a card-linked rewards layer extends the LTV curve by giving lapsed payers a reason to return.
A studio's existing virtual currency - gems, coins, season tokens. Linq cashback is denominated in this currency rather than in dollars, so the reward is immediately useful inside the game. The conversion rate is set by the studio.