PayGate (paygate.to) offers a similar idea: take card payments, pay out in crypto. The difference is how serious the platform on the other side of that promise is — the company, the fee structure, the dashboard, the support and the accountability behind every transaction.
If you're handling real money, you want a platform with a registered company, published flat fees, a proper transaction dashboard and a support channel staffed by humans you can hold accountable. Malum offers all of that. The same checks against PayGate produce a different picture.
The card-to-crypto idea is solid — but the implementation matters. These are the dimensions on which a serious merchant should evaluate any gateway in this category.
Malum is operated by Malum Limited, a registered legal entity (Office 961 House of Francis, Ile du Port, Mahé, Seychelles). There is a company you can address, a registered office and a published legal stack — Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, AML/ATF Policy, Acceptable Use Policy and more. PayGate operates anonymously without a publicly identifiable operating entity.
Malum's merchant discount is a single flat published rate. PayGate's fee structure has been reported to vary significantly per transaction and to spike on smaller payments, with merchants reporting effective deductions that can approach 50% on low-ticket items. With Malum you know what you'll keep before you switch the integration on.
Malum ships a full merchant dashboard — searchable transaction history, payout queue, refunds, customer profiles, team roles, webhooks, API keys, hosted storefront, custom domains, plugin integrations and exportable reports. PayGate's reporting surface is significantly thinner and the historical transaction record is not comprehensive in the same way.
| Feature | Malum | PayGate |
|---|---|---|
| Operating entity | Malum Limited, registered in Seychelles, with a published legal address | No publicly identifiable operating entity |
| Fee structure | Single flat published merchant discount | Variable per-transaction, reportedly up to ~50% on small payments |
| Card-to-crypto | Yes — settled crypto to your wallet in minutes | Yes |
| Chargeback-free | Yes — settled crypto cannot be reversed | Same conceptual model, less merchant protection in practice |
| Merchant dashboard | Full dashboard: history, payouts, refunds, team, webhooks, API, storefront | Limited reporting surface |
| Transaction history | Searchable, exportable, with reconciliation reports | No comprehensive historical record |
| Support | Telegram, email and live chat — staffed by humans | Informal, no published SLA |
| Compliance posture | Published AML/ATF, privacy, geographic restriction and acceptable use policies | No published legal / compliance framework |
| Plugins / integrations | Shopify, WooCommerce, SellAuth, REST API, custom-domain proxy | Limited integrations |
| Hosted storefront | Built-in with products, reviews, custom domain | No native storefront |
| Merchant team & roles | Workspaces with owner / admin / finance / support / viewer roles | Single-account only |
| Auditable receipts | Buyer-facing invoices, refund receipts, exportable CSV | Not provided in the same form |
Five questions worth asking before you route real customer money through any card-to-crypto gateway.
Card-to-crypto is, structurally, a high-trust relationship: the gateway holds card-side funds for an unbounded period before settling crypto. The first question to ask is therefore "who is the gateway?" — what entity, in what jurisdiction, with what published terms of service, with what privacy policy, with what dispute / escalation path.
Malum is operated by Malum Limited, with a published legal address at Office 961 House of Francis, Ile du Port, Mahé, Seychelles, a full set of published Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, AML/ATF Policy, Acceptable Use Policy and a registered support address. PayGate, by contrast, does not publish a comparable operating entity or legal stack.
A flat published merchant discount means you can model your unit economics before you go live. Malum publishes a single rate, applied consistently across transactions in a given tier.
PayGate's fee structure has been described as variable per transaction, with merchants reporting effective deductions that can climb significantly on smaller transactions — in some reported cases approaching half the transaction value. That makes pricing your product, running a sale or running a low-ticket business effectively impossible.
A serious merchant needs to be able to reconstruct what happened: which customer paid, when, with which card BIN, at which exchange rate, with which fee applied, into which wallet. Malum exposes that history in the dashboard and as exportable CSV / API, and webhooks fire on every state change.
On PayGate, comparable historical reporting is not available in the same comprehensive form.
Malum runs a real support function — Telegram (@MalumAdmin), email ([email protected]) and live chat — staffed by humans, with a published support address attached to the operating entity. Issues get tickets, escalations get tracked, and there is a registered company behind the response.
PayGate's support model is informal and not backed by a publicly identifiable operating entity, which limits a merchant's ability to escalate when something goes wrong.
A gateway that takes card payments needs a published compliance framework. Malum publishes its AML/ATF Policy, Acceptable Use Policy and Geographic Restrictions, so merchants know in advance what is allowed, what isn't, and how the platform handles regulated flows.
That stack also matters for the merchant's own risk posture: routing customer payments through a counterparty without a published compliance framework is a tail-risk that doesn't show up until it does.
Malum is a full payments platform, not only a checkout. Beyond card-to-crypto acceptance you get:
Card-to-crypto with a real company, published flat fees, a proper dashboard and humans on the other end of support.
Comparisons are based on publicly available information from each provider's website and product documentation at the time of writing and are provided for informational purposes only. Trademarks and brand names are the property of their respective owners; their use here is purely descriptive and does not imply endorsement, affiliation, or partnership. Pricing, fees, payout times, supported regions and product features change frequently — always verify directly with each provider before making a decision.