Introducing Bonus Cash

Conjured Currency| Illustrated by by Steve Argyle

Hello traders!

Starting this week, we pushed the necessary technical changes to support what we’re calling “Bonus Cash.”

Bonus Cash is a separate balance in your ledger which tracks any kind of site credit that you receive from either a gift code, promotional event, or earned through a specific user action, such as trading during a promotional period. It can be redeemed just like a user balance is redeemed, except it has no cash value when held in an account, and therefore cannot be cashed out or used to pay fees associated with cash-outs. When a user spends Bonus Cash to receive a trade, Cardsphere converts the Bonus Cash to real money when the sender is credited for that trade.

TL;DR

• Bonus Cash is a promotional balance that works like real money, but has no cash value and expires.
• Bonus Cash comes from a code redemption or by completing a qualifying activity.
• Bonus Cash becomes real money when spent on Cardsphere.

Is This Funny Money?

No, we are still against funny money, points instead of USD, and made-up currencies, and that will not change. I have always said that anything but fiat currency as a balance is only a benefit to the company and not the user, and that is still true with Bonus Cash. So, while it’s not funny money, it does benefit Cardsphere in a way we wish to be transparent about.

So, what is Bonus Cash exactly? It’s a way for us to still award promotional credit on Cardsphere, while changing when Cardsphere parent company Space Cow Media must account for that credit as a financial liability.

In the past, when we’ve given out promo codes, we’ve redeemed them for real money that is booked, accounted for, and yes, stored in a bank. The problem we’ve run into since we started advertising this way is that often someone will redeem the code and then never trade, leaving the company stuck with a user that has some money on the books that we have to account for forever. This exists primarily to solve that problem. Now, if someone redeems a code and then never comes back, the balance expires and we aren't left to track that money and user forever.

The important distinction here is that while Bonus Cash itself has no cash value, Bonus Cash becomes real USD once it’s spent. After a trade happens, when the funds are released to the sender, the sender receives actual currency, Cardsphere stops tracking it as Bonus Cash, and it just becomes part of the sender’s balance. Only the spent portion of Bonus Cash becomes real money when it’s released to the sender; the remaining Bonus Cash remains a promotional credit until spent or expired.

How Does It Work?

Bonus Cash can be used to receive trades, make Instant Buys on Marketplace, or subscribe to or gift Cardsphere Premium, and is always consumed before any fiat funds from your account are consumed. Aside from that, it behaves just like a single balance, so you don’t have to try to spend it separately; if you don’t have enough to cover a transaction with Bonus Cash, your normal balance is used. The presence of Bonus Cash in your account does not impact other users matching with you on the Send page; it’s completely transparent to anyone else, and they only ever see your entire balance.

Bonus Cash expires after a certain amount of time, determined by us when it’s issued. You can view your Bonus Cash balance in the ledger, where it’s clearly displayed separately from your normal balance, along with a warning if your next sum of Bonus Cash will expire soon. If you have multiple Bonus Cash balances, clicking the new “View bonus cash expiry dates” button will show you each individual balance amount and expiration date.

While Bonus Cash is in your account, there is also an indicator next to your balance that shows that at least part of your balance is comprised of Bonus Cash, and hovering over your balance gives you more detail.

Disputes and Refunds

If a transaction made with Bonus Cash is disputed and results in a refund, the user who spent the Bonus Cash receives a refund in Bonus Cash, but has the expiry reset so they have ample time to spend that Bonus Cash again, and that new expiry can be viewed from the ledger.

Any balances transferred during the dispute process to pay for things such as postage due or return postage will also come from Bonus Cash first and are, again, converted to real currency when they land in the other user’s account.

So How Do We Earn Bonus Cash?

Bonus Cash opens the door for a lot of interesting promotional opportunities, but for the remainder of 2026, it will be used primarily for promotional balances to incentivize new users to join the community. However, we are already brainstorming ways for existing users to earn Bonus Cash, but we won’t have more to say on that until 2027.