Finance affiliate programs with recurring commission, and where to find them
By the LinkedAffiliate team ·
Most finance programs pay once. A reader opens a bank account or gets a card approved, you earn a fixed amount, and that is the end of it, even though the company may earn from that customer for the next ten years. So anyone looking for finance programs that keep paying is looking for the exception, and it helps to know where the exceptions live.
They live in a few specific places: subscription tools, platforms that share the fees a customer generates, insurance that renews, and deals that mix a one-off payment with an ongoing one. This guide explains each, the terms that decide what they are worth, and how to compare an ongoing offer with the flat fee most of the category pays.
Where to start in the directory
These are the 5 finance programs in the directory with published terms, best rate first. Each name links to its listing, which shows the terms we read and the page we read them from.
| Program | Best rate | Cookie window | Networks |
|---|---|---|---|
| BillingNow | 35% | 90 days | Direct (in-house) |
| XTB.com | 0.2% | 364 days | Direct (in-house) |
| Coinpanda | See listing | 7 days | Direct (in-house) |
| simplywall.st | See listing | 90 days | Direct (in-house) |
| SparkReceipt | See listing | 60 days | Direct (in-house) |
The table does not say which of these programs pay on an ongoing basis. The directory does not yet record recurring payment as its own field, so a figure here may be paid once or every month. Open the listing, follow the link to the source page and look for the words that describe duration: "recurring", "revenue share", "lifetime", "on renewals", "for 12 months". Treat the table as a shortlist to check, and expect it to change as we add programs and companies correct their own listings.
If you want the programs that publish the biggest numbers, our guide to the highest paying finance affiliate programs ranks them and explains which step each one pays on. This page is about the smaller group that keeps paying.
Do bank and credit card affiliate programs pay recurring commission?
Rarely. Most bank account and card programs pay a fixed amount once, when the application is approved or the account is funded. The company earns from that customer for years, but it pays the affiliate up front instead of sharing each month. Recurring payments in finance are more common on subscription tools, trading platforms that share fee revenue, and some insurance programs that pay on renewals.
That is not a worse deal by default. A flat fee on an approved account is money you can count once the hold period ends, and it does not depend on the customer staying. The question is which structure suits your readers, and that depends on which of the products below you write about.
Four places recurring pay shows up in finance
Subscription tools. Budgeting apps, personal finance trackers, invoicing and accounting software, tax filing tools and paid research or newsletter services all charge a monthly or yearly fee. These behave like any software subscription: you earn a share of each payment for as long as the terms say. They are the most predictable source of ongoing commission in the category, and our guide to the highest paying SaaS affiliate programs covers the wider subscription market they belong to.
Revenue share on trading and investing platforms. Some brokers, trading apps and crypto exchanges pay a share of the fees, commissions or spreads a referred customer generates. A customer who trades every week earns you a steady income. A customer who opens an account, buys once and never logs in again earns you almost nothing. The payment recurs, but its size is not fixed.
Insurance renewals. A policy that renews every year can carry a commission on each renewal, not only on the first premium. Where this exists, it is often a smaller percentage on renewals than on the first year. Many insurance affiliate programs still pay only on the first policy, so check before assuming.
Hybrid deals. Some programs pay a fixed amount when the account is opened or funded, plus a smaller ongoing share after that. These are common on trading platforms and are sometimes offered only to affiliates who already send volume. The fixed part covers your effort up front, and the ongoing part rewards you for sending customers who stay active.
What is the difference between revenue share and recurring commission?
A recurring commission is usually a share of a fixed payment, such as a monthly subscription. Revenue share is a share of whatever the company earns from the customer, such as trading fees or interest, so it goes up and down with how active the customer is. Both keep paying after the first month, but revenue share is much harder to predict.
That difference changes how you plan. A subscription share can be estimated from a plan price and a guess at how long people stay. A revenue share depends on behaviour you cannot see: how often your readers trade, how much they hold, whether markets are busy. It can be worth a lot or very little, and two quiet months can look like a broken program when it is simply quiet markets.
Five terms that decide what it is worth
How long it lasts. The same line that matters on every recurring program. A share for the first year and a share for the life of the customer can carry the same headline figure and pay very different amounts. Finance customers can stay a long time once they move their money somewhere, which makes a lifetime term worth more here than on many consumer apps.
What the share is a share of. On a subscription, it is usually the plan price. On revenue share, read exactly which income counts: trading fees, spreads, interest, account fees, or only some of them. Some programs subtract costs, rebates or bonuses paid to the customer before working out your share, which can shrink it a lot.
Negative balances and carry-over. On some revenue share deals, if a customer costs the company money in a month (for example through a bonus they claimed), that loss is taken off your earnings, and in some terms it carries over into later months. Look for words like "negative carry-over" or "net revenue" and make sure you know whether a bad month can wipe out a good one.
Activity rules. Some programs only keep paying while you keep sending new customers, or stop the ongoing share if your account goes quiet for a set number of months. A recurring income that ends when you take a break is less durable than it looks.
Holds, reversals and closures. Finance programs often hold commission longer than others while they watch for fraud and early closures, and that applies to ongoing payments too. Read what happens to your share if the customer closes the account, if the company changes the program or if your affiliate account is closed. Our guide to affiliate payout terms explains holds, thresholds and net terms.
Rules on ongoing payments
Financial products are regulated, and in some countries the rules reach ongoing payments to whoever introduced the customer, especially on investments and insurance. That is one reason some programs offer revenue share in one country and only a flat fee in another, or none at all. The program's terms are the place to check what applies where your readers live.
The same advertising rules apply as on any finance program: required risk warnings, no promises about returns, approved wording where the program asks for it, and a clear affiliate disclosure near the link. An ongoing share makes this matter more, not less, because a reversal or a closed account can take future months with it.
How to compare a recurring offer with a flat fee
Put both on the same scale by estimating what one referred customer is worth to you:
- For the flat fee, take the amount and multiply it by the share of your readers likely to reach the paying step, such as an approved or funded account.
- For a subscription share, multiply the plan price by the rate, then by the number of payments you can reasonably expect, which is the shorter of the program's duration and how long a customer like that tends to stay.
- For revenue share, use a cautious guess at what a typical customer of yours generates in a month, and the same cautious guess for how long they stay active.
- Subtract the months you will wait for holds to clear, and allow for reversals if your readers often sign up and leave.
The point is not a precise number. It is to stop a large flat fee on a step most readers never reach, or an open-ended revenue share on customers who will barely trade, from looking better than it is. Our guide to affiliate commission types shows the same comparison with worked examples.
Match the structure to your readers
Ongoing commission rewards readers who stay and stay active. A site for freelancers and small businesses suits invoicing and accounting tools, which people keep paying for as long as they run the business. Content for active investors suits revenue share, because your readers are the ones generating the fees. A blog for people opening their first account suits flat fees, because those readers may never trade enough to make a revenue share worth having.
If your readers buy once and move on, take the flat fee. If they will still be using the product next year, look for the program that pays you for that.
Where to go from here
Browse every program in the finance category, open the listings on your shortlist and read the duration, revenue definition and carry-over lines on each source page. If you are new to how referrals are tracked, our guide to affiliate cookie windows explains why the first click still matters on a program that pays for years.