# Crypto Card Providers Bet on Cross-Selling to Improve Customer Economics

By John Kim

Canonical URL: https://www.tokenpost.com/news/business/45916
Published: 2026-11-01T15:13:18.000Z
Updated: 2026-11-01T15:13:18.000Z
Section: Business

> KAST says growth spending pushed it into losses, while Bleap says card-only users who collect cashback can be unprofitable. Neither disclosure establishes that cross-selling has produced profits.

Crypto card firms KAST and Bleap are relying on services beyond card purchases to improve customer economics, as executives describe acquisition spending and cashback-only users as potential sources of losses.

KAST CEO Raagulan Pathy said increased growth spending moved the company from near break-even to loss-making. Bleap Latvia CEO Eduards Timofejevs said customers who use only Bleap’s card and collect cashback can be unprofitable.

“You take a loss on acquiring the customer at the beginning, but then you sell them more and more features,” Pathy said. He pointed to trading, lending, membership fees and business services as potential revenue beyond card purchases.

KAST’s Reserve rewards dollar balances. KAST set launch rewards at 6% to 12%, capped initial aggregate balances at $100 million and planned to fund the program through company revenue and its corporate balance sheet. Pathy said Reserve’s backing assets generated 3.5% to 4%, and the product had attracted tens of millions of dollars by September. KAST did not disclose an exact Reserve balance or subsidy total.

Bleap gives 1% default cashback, with 20% rates for selected subscriptions subject to merchant-specific limits. Cashback is generally credited in USD Coin (USDC).

Bybit EU cut non-VIP cashback from tiered rates of 2% to 10%, which carried monthly caps, to a flat, uncapped 1%. Existing cardholders moved to the new rate Aug. 4, 2026, at 8 a.m. ET (12 p.m. UTC); eligible subscription cashback became a first-month benefit capped at €50.

U.S. debit-card interchange averaged 0.73% of transaction value in 2024, with averages of 1.21% on transactions exempt from federal caps and 0.47% on covered transactions. These national averages do not establish what a particular crypto-card company receives, especially when card economics are shared with program partners.

At a Feb. 9, 2026, cutoff, about 80% of ether.fi Cash users also used its Liquid yield product, showing product overlap but not profitability.

Cross-selling remains a strategy, not a demonstrated outcome: the executive statements and customer overlap do not establish that the relationships are profitable. KAST plans to shift Reserve rewards to 4% to 8% in January 2027.