Expert insights, guides, and best practices for payment processing, merchant of record services, and building scalable commerce platforms.
How solo founders should choose a merchant of record for selling software globally: why tax compliance breaks first, what actually matters at small scale, the platforms worth considering, and how to avoid migrating twice.
PayFac vs. ISV explained: what an independent software vendor is, how the referral, revenue-share, and payfac models differ, what each earns per transaction, and how software platforms should decide between them.
A guide to the major payfac companies in 2026: the consumer-facing payment facilitators, the managed payfac providers serving software platforms, how registered payment facilitators differ, and how to choose between them.
PayFac-as-a-Service explained: how managed payment facilitation works, what it costs compared to full registration, the revenue economics for software platforms, and how to tell whether you need it or a merchant of record instead.
PayFac vs. payment processor vs. gateway vs. aggregator vs. merchant of record: what each layer of the payments stack actually does, how they fit together, which ones overlap, and which model your business needs.
PayFac vs. ISO explained: who holds the merchant account, how onboarding and underwriting differ, who carries the risk, how the economics compare, and which model fits your business in 2026.
A complete guide to the payment facilitator (PayFac) model: what a payfac is, how master merchant accounts and sub-merchants work, what it costs to become one, PayFac-as-a-Service explained, and the tax liability the model leaves with you.
Seven concrete merchant of record examples, from the Apple App Store and Steam to Paddle, FastSpring, and Comecero, showing how the MoR model works in practice, what each arrangement covers, and how to tell who the merchant of record is on any transaction.
Seller of record vs. merchant of record explained: what each term actually means, who owns the commercial obligations versus the payment and tax liability, when the two roles split apart, and which one your business needs.
Paddle vs. Lemon Squeezy compared head-to-head for 2026 on pricing and fees, checkout, subscription billing, developer experience, the impact of Stripe's acquisition of Lemon Squeezy, and which merchant of record fits your stage.