Updated September 2026: This is a revised archive of a 2011 Perfect Money registration promotion. It is not a current guide to registration, funding, transfers, withdrawals, or investing. The old interface screenshots, tracked signup URL, fixed-return promotion, and unsupported bank-card and payment-route claims have been removed from the article.
Conflict disclosure: The original signup URL contained a promotion parameter, so the article may have had a commercial conflict. I can no longer verify the old agreement, attribution, or compensation records and will not guess whether any payment was received. This revision contains no Perfect Money signup link, and clicking or using its in-article links does not generate Perfect Money-related compensation for me.
Table of Contents
Why the old tutorial should not be followed
The 2011 article called Perfect Money an “online bank” and presented multi-currency balances, bank-card deposits and withdrawals, low fees, a fixed return, and use for investment projects as established features. A set of interface screenshots later stored on this site walked readers through registration and transfers.
Those materials now show only how the service was promoted at the time. A payment service’s operator, licence, supported countries, card acquirer, exchangers, fees, identity checks, refunds, and withdrawal rules can all change. Old screenshots are particularly misleading because a button’s former existence does not mean the same funding route works today.
The old post also described an e-wallet balance as though it were a bank deposit and used a fixed annual return to encourage users to leave money there. That comparison does not hold. E-money, payment accounts, bank deposits, and investments may involve different debtors, protection regimes, insolvency priorities, and complaint routes. Until those facts are established, a return figure should not be treated as passive income, and a payment tool should not be treated as a deposit or investment account.
A cautious historical timeline
| Date | What the evidence establishes | What it does not establish |
|---|---|---|
| August 2008 | The Swiss Federal Banking Commission’s unauthorised-institutions list in FINMA’s official archive listed Perfect Money Finance Corp. on August 5, 2008; its detail page recorded the historical domain. The list says listed entities lacked that commission’s authorisation while expressly noting that a listing did not necessarily mean their activity was illegal. | It does not establish licensing in other jurisdictions or the service’s later or present status. |
| July 2011 | The service homepage preserved by the Internet Archive shows that the brand was then publishing an electronic-payment offering online. | A company’s own page does not independently verify licensing, protection of customer money, fees, ability to pay, or promoted returns. |
| September 1, 2026 | In this review environment, the historical official domain did not resolve in DNS, so current terms, legal entity, licences, fees, and supported routes could not be obtained from the original service. | A single technical check cannot prove that a service closed, moved, or continues to operate, and cannot show that a look-alike domain belongs to the same operator. |
This corrects the old article’s most important error: use of a Swiss address or the label “Swiss online bank” did not establish that the service was a Swiss-regulated bank. Regulatory identity must come from the regulator’s records.
Because current official information cannot be obtained from the historical domain, I will not republish registration steps or decide whether Perfect Money is usable today. Any website claiming to replace, mirror, or continue the brand must be checked afresh from its own legal entity and regulatory record.
Due diligence for e-wallets and payment services
1. Identify the legal entity and permission scope
Use the customer agreement—not the brand homepage—to record:
- the full legal company name and place of incorporation;
- the regulator, licence or registration number, and current status;
- the official domain and contact details attached to that licence;
- the specific services and territories covered;
- the entity that holds customer money, processes payments, and owes refunds;
- the complaint, arbitration, or court jurisdiction.
Then work backwards from the regulator’s website. EU and EEA payment and e-money institutions can be searched through the EBA PSD2 central register. A stored-value facility offered in Hong Kong should be checked against the HKMA register of licensees. Use the relevant regulator’s official register elsewhere.
Ordinary incorporation, a domain, an app-store page, or a “partner” badge is not a payment licence. Absence from a warning list is not authorisation either.
2. Establish what the balance is and how it is protected
Do not assume that words such as “account,” “deposit,” or “online banking” make the balance a bank deposit. Confirm in the current terms and regulatory record:
- whether it is a bank deposit, e-money, stored value, a token, or an ordinary claim against a company;
- whether customer funds are segregated or protected by insurance or a guarantee;
- which balances and transaction stages receive that protection;
- who returns money if the operator fails, how long that may take, and whether administration costs may be deducted;
- whether deposit insurance or another statutory compensation scheme applies and its limit.
The UK FCA’s guide to non-bank payment providers illustrates an important distinction. In the UK, customer funds at non-bank payment and e-money institutions are not directly covered by the FSCS deposit-protection scheme; they instead rely on safeguarding arrangements, and a failure can still produce delay or a shortfall after administration costs. Other jurisdictions differ, so check the regime attached to the contracting entity rather than importing another country’s protection.
3. Turn “bank cards supported” into a complete funds-flow check
“Supports cards in this country” is not precise enough. Confirm each part:
- deposit or withdrawal; credit card, debit card, bank transfer, or third-party exchanger;
- issuing countries, card networks, currencies, and account-name rules;
- the acquirer and the merchant name that will appear on the statement;
- whether the issuer treats it as a cash advance or high-risk transaction;
- transaction and cumulative limits, failed-payment refund timing, withdrawal review, and fees;
- rules for disputes, chargebacks, and misdirected transfers.
Treat a route as available only when the provider’s current official terms, its licence record, and your own financial institution agree. An old screenshot in a third-party blog cannot complete that check.
4. Calculate every fee and exchange-rate risk
Compare more than the displayed transfer fee. Include funding, withdrawal, account, verification, third-party exchange, foreign-exchange spread, minimum, inactivity, and refund charges. Establish which rate is used, when it becomes final, who pays correspondent-bank or card-network costs, and what the recipient will actually receive.
Holding several currency balances does not create a return by itself. Currency or gold-denominated units can fall in value, while the platform’s bid-ask spread and conversion fees reduce the result.
5. Ask harder questions about any balance return
If a payment service says a balance earns interest, rewards, or another return, first establish:
- which legal entity owes the return;
- whether it is deposit interest, a promotion, lending income, or an investment return;
- whether the rate varies or requires a lock-up, transaction volume, or withdrawal condition;
- whether principal can be lost and whether independent custody, audits, or statutory protection exist;
- whether regulated disclosures explain the source of the yield.
If those questions cannot be answered, do not leave money in the wallet merely to earn a return. A yield above ordinary cash-management levels normally transfers credit, liquidity, market, or operational risk to the user; it is not a risk-free benefit.
6. Verify the recipient and assume recovery will be difficult
The U.S. FTC’s payment-app safety guide warns that money sent to a scammer is usually difficult to recover. Before sending, independently confirm the recipient and account identifier, recheck the currency and amount, enable multi-factor authentication and transaction alerts, and never give a password, verification code, or remote-control access to someone who contacted you.
For an unauthorised transaction or scam, immediately contact the payment service and linked bank, ask whether the transfer can be stopped or reversed, and report it to the relevant law-enforcement or consumer-protection body. Do not pay a supposed recovery agent an unlocking fee, tax, or deposit.
7. Treat exchangers and promoters as additional counterparties
The wallet operator, funding agent, exchanger, card issuer, and receiving platform may be different companies. Each layer adds identity, licensing, fee, data-sharing, and trapped-funds risk. A claimed “certified exchanger” should be verified both in the payment service’s current official directory and in the exchanger’s local official register.
Signup links, registration rewards, and transaction-based compensation give an author or agent a financial interest in reader activity. Any review should disclose who pays, which actions trigger compensation, and whether the author actually tested withdrawals and complaints. A tutorial without those disclosures is not neutral evidence.
A simple stopping rule
If current official terms and regulatory registers do not jointly establish the legal entity, authorisation, official domain, protection of funds, fees, supported territory, and complaint route, do not register, upload identity documents, or send money. Use an alternative with a clear regulatory identity, customer-fund rules, and enforceable redress where you live.
This archive does not determine Perfect Money’s current operating status and is not personalised financial advice. Its lesson is that payment buttons are easy to screenshot and returns are easy to advertise; the real work is identifying who owes the money, which law binds them, and who can provide redress when something fails.