Show notes
Everyone's telling you cohort financing is free money to scale. It's not, and the contract fine print is where that story falls apart.Josh Chandley (President & COO, Wildcard Games) sits down with Phil Mohr (CEO & Co-founder, Metica) and Martin Macmillan (Founder, Pollen Capital) to break down what cohort financing actually costs, who really takes the risk, and how founders keep getting burned by deals they don't fully understand. Martin lent almost $1B through Pollen VC with zero credit defaults over a decade. Phil looked at 40-50 games before Metica stopped writing new cohort deals altogether. Between them, they unpack the math the sales guys don't want you to run.Topics Covered:• UA financing vs cohort financing• Why receivables lending scaled down• The 80/20 mechanics of a cohort deal• Who actually takes the risk on a cohort• Cross-collateralization and disguised liens• What makes a good candidate for financing• Breakeven windows and LTV curve shape• The real annualized cost of cohort financing• How financing cost raises your effective CPI• Why finance and UA teams don't align• Getting free debt from your ad networks• Red flags in cohort financing contracts• What happens when a cohort underperforms• Debt plus equity hybrid dealsCHAPTERS:



