The Payments Experts Podcast
Expert payments attorneys discuss the electronic payments industry from a legal perspective.
The Payments Experts Podcast
Lending Against Residuals: How ISOs Really Scale with Super G Capital | Darrin Ginsberg | PEP085
The payments world didn’t just change—it rewired who holds the power. Christopher Dryden, Founding and Managing Partner of Global Legal Law Firm, sits down with Darrin Ginsberg of Super G Capital (https://www.supergcapital.com/) to chart the path from door-to-door ISO sales to e commerce gateways and the rise of embedded payments. Darrin shares how he built one of CSI’s largest offices, why e commerce distribution beat terminal leases, and what he learned buying 50+ portfolios before turning that knowledge into loans secured by residual streams.
We sit down with Darrin Ginsberg of Super G Capital to trace the arc from ISO sales to e commerce gateways to lending against residuals. We unpack how ISVs seized leverage, why banks don’t fund portfolios, and where smart capital actually drives ISO growth.
• early ISO sales tactics and CSI scale
• pivot to online processing and gateways
• seminars and referral partnerships for distribution
• portfolio buying, attrition, and concentration risk
• creating loans collateralized by residuals
• underwriting beyond statements and rates
• ISVs gaining power and shifting rev shares
• why banks won’t underwrite recurring revenue
• MCAs vs structured ISO lending
• best uses of capital, including agent buybacks
• coaching founders on overhead and pay plans
• health journey, resilience, and return to lending
• loan sizes, terms, and how to contact Super G
We get into the mechanics that most outsiders miss. Banks still don’t treat a merchant portfolio as a real asset, so ISOs with strong monthly revenue can’t access traditional credit. Darrin explains how he underwrites beyond the residual report—looking at sales models, stickiness, leases, software integrations, and support—to price risk and structure deals that actually help companies grow. We also unpack the ISV power shift: early rev shares near 10% ballooned to 90% as platforms realized their leverage, with many becoming their own ISOs. If you’re not selling software or embedded into it, you’re fighting uphill.
Capital is only as good as its use. Darrin breaks down high-ROI moves—buying back dormant agent residuals at favorable multiples, funding proven marketing, securing equipment for frictionless installs, and opening scalable recruiting hubs—and warns against draining loans to pay off low-rate mortgages or paper over broken unit economics. We contrast sustainable ISO lending with merchant cash advances that trap businesses in costly cycles. Along the way, Darrin’s health journey adds perspective on resilience and focus, and why fundamentals still win in a market obsessed with headlines.
If you’re an ISO, ISV, or PayFac operator looking to scale with discipline, this conversation gives you a clear playbook on underwriting, attrition, portfolio value, and the smarter ways to deploy growth capital. Subscribe, share with your team, and leave a review with the one change you’re making to your model this quarter.
**Matters discussed are all opinions and do not constitute legal advice. All events or likeness to real people and events is a coincidence.**
Visit Global Legal Law Firm today: https://www.globallegallawfirm.com/podcasts/
A payments podcast of Global Legal Law Firm
I was talking to one of our clients yesterday, and he's got through acquisitions, he now he has a ACH portfolio. Okay. And it's through Nuve now.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_03:And Nuve has had to change the economics of its relationships with the ISV, which has decreased his percentage of the revenue shares for. Sure. And he doesn't, he like there, there, there wasn't he's not complaining, he gets it. But you know, I think one of the things that was funny is that ISVs, when when they first came into the marketplace, they were using ISOs as the entry point. Correct. And that's totally changed.
SPEAKER_02:And the ISOs were paying them, I mean, dog shit. Yeah, 10 dogs. Rev share. Yeah. Totally. When I started with Mind Body, I think our Rev share was 10%. By the time I ended that relationship with them, they were at 90% split. Totally. They just learned the business. They learned how much value they were bringing to the proposition and said, what do we need you for? And eventually they went off on their own and became their own ISO. Yeah, and that's the It's kind of the same way a rep does. You know, a lot of reps start in the industry as a sales agent for an ISO and they end up becoming their own ISO.
SPEAKER_00:Welcome to the Payments Experts Podcast. A podcast of Global Legal Law Firm. We hope you enjoy this episode. Really excited today in studio. Joining us is founding and managing partner of the law firm, Christopher Dryden, as well as our special guest, Darren Ginsberg, with Super G Capital. You can find Darren over at SuperG Capital.com. General, we're looking forward to this conversation. I think you guys have known each other for quite a while, haven't you?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I would I would say, well, thank you for being here. Um thank you for having me. Oh, yeah, for sure, man. It's great. I finally got you down here. I've been so yes, I've known Darren for a long time. Um when I came into payments mid-2000s, um you know, I was pretty tentative when I would go to shows and whatnot, and you know, trying to get my feet wet, understand what was happening. Payments isn't the easiest thing to understand. And I I can remember we were at something in Scottsdale, it was like 2013. You had that little um hoverboard. That hoverboard thing that you're you're riding around. And I think that was the first time I talked to you in length. Like I talked to you before, but I think that was like the first time I ever like hung out with you at a show, and and ever since then, you know, I I've always considered you a a friend, like because we're sort of like on the outside periphery of this world that we live in and we do different things. But if you unless you've been living under a rock chair, Darren's experience leveling payments, he's super G now, but he hasn't always been Super G. And I think for a lot of people, like it would be a great introduction. I think Darren's Rolodex is way bigger than mine as far as knowing people in the in the business. But I think it'd be good for you to just tell people who you are and how you got to Super G because you know your early days, sure, you know payments better than most people.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I got into the business really young, I was 22 years old, and I became um a sales agent for a small ISO in Orange County. And um, I really learned a little bit about payment processing and selling terminals and things of that nature, and that was back in like 1990, yeah, when the industry was first starting and when terminals were just becoming a thing. Back before that, it was knucklebusters and imprinting cards and calling 800 numbers to get authorization.
SPEAKER_04:Exactly. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:So I got into the industry, I think, at the right time, right at the beginning uh of the infancy of the electronic payments industry. And in by the time I got to 1992, I joined up with a group called Card Service International, which I'm sure you have uh I always love to call them CSI.
SPEAKER_03:You know, like the the TV show, like in our world, it's the the CSI.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, we we kind of dominated Southern California by far, and uh joined up with them in '92. By 1994, I'd become their largest sales office. Um, and we were writing, you know, 300, 400 new uh merchants a month. We were at that time didn't even earn residual income. All we did was sell leases.
SPEAKER_03:And we can but you guys did so here's the interesting thing about Darren. So Darren's COO at some point in the 90s was a guy named Paul Rianda. Yeah, how is that? And so it's interesting because you guys sold websites too or something like that. Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_02:So in 92, we started out just selling terminals like everybody else, and it was a great business uh uh that built up um through through the 90s. And by 1998, you know, the internet had come around and people were starting to do processing on the internet, and so I really wanted to do processing on the internet, and Card Service International did not want us to do that. They wanted us to still to sell brick and mortar uh businesses. And so I left Card Service International. I left about 17,000 merchants that I had signed up with them over the years and started up a company called e-commerce exchange. And that's where we focused on doing processing on the internet. We were one of the first people to start selling gateways like Authorize Net. We actually got Authorize Net to give us a private label gateway. We were one of the first private label gateways, and we started pushing websites along with processing.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, Paul told me you guys used to do like uh seminars for like small business owners. We did. You'd have them come in and then you'd show them your suite of products that you could like help them uh expand when the internet.
SPEAKER_02:The way we really grew was by doing events and getting referral partnerships. So at these events, you know, there would be 500 people at an event and they would all be interested in buying some type of business and getting into online businesses. And so if they were going to sign up and have an online business, they had to have credit card processing. And so we provided the credit card processing for those clients. Who were you working through at that point? Um at that time we were working with Humboldt Bank, actually. Oh, okay. Yeah. So they were one of the only banks at the time that would do uh processing for online businesses. And it didn't really matter what the type of business was?
SPEAKER_03:No. No, you just anything? Anything. Anybody that would have like a checkout? Exactly. That's awesome. Yeah. Um so eventually you make your way to lending, because I've only known you as a lender in the space.
SPEAKER_02:How did you transition? So after I um so after e-commerce exchange, I sold that business in 2000, right before the dot com crash. I had a big investment firm came in and and and bought my company from me. Um and so I retired at 32 years old and thought life was gonna be grand. I was just gonna travel the world and have fun. And shortly within two years, I realized that every one of my friends, everybody I knew, was already still in the business and still working and couldn't come out and travel with me. So I got back into the business with some of my older agents that were worked for me and got back into the business. And so um Did you rebrand or were you still doing e-commerce and no, I had sold everything. So uh, you know, I I joined in with another some other agents of mine uh that had an office in Chicago and they needed help in in promoting the business and doing marketing and things of that nature. And so I jumped in to help with that. And I also at that during that time started buying portfolios.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, how'd you how'd you segue into that?
SPEAKER_02:Um I was looking for something where I didn't need any people to do it, where I could just buy a portfolio and earn cash flow off of that portfolio. And so um I realized I could buy portfolios at a decent multiple back then, uh, where we were paying, you know, 18 times uh, you know uh monthly revenue for portfolios. And so I bought about 50 portfolios. And during that time of buying those portfolios, I realized attrition uh was kind of like the the big thing about buying portfolios. If your attrition was too high, you would not do very well on the portfolio. And so I kind of at that point figured out how to lend, I decided to try to lend to a merchant uh into an ISO rather than to uh buy in their portfolio. And so I started that up in about 2008. I decided I would just loan money to somebody against their portfolio and use their portfolio as collateral, and that's kind of how SuperG got started.
SPEAKER_03:But the the the purchasing side, like was all of it kind of self-taught coming from the idea of like, I get my residual report, I understand the revenue and expense to get to my net and if I gotta share anything. And then doing portfolio analysis, did that did you know how to do that before you started buying?
SPEAKER_02:Um, I I learned as I was buying. And you know, you had to learn to sort the portfolio by largest merchants to smallest merchants to see if a portfolio was top heavy or not top heavy, or if it had multiple chain locations in there that you might not want to buy because if you lose one merchant, you lose 40 merchants.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And so uh yeah, so I kind of learned on the go and uh was very successful. Most of the portfolios I bought, I made money with, but a few of them I I lost money and and you know, learned from that and realized at that point in time I figured I should stop because attrition had started climbing past the 10% rate. Um, I decided I should probably maybe try something else, and that's where I did a loan to a client and it worked out well, and I decided to continue on the loan path.
SPEAKER_03:And was that um skill set pretty transferable when you started doing underwriting of merchants related? Because I mean I absolutely so I and I guess this is my question, which is probably when you're doing a loan even today, are you just looking at the residual and and I mean uh obviously primarily you're looking at the residual for the underwriting, and I'm sure that's kind of like you went from buying to lending and using those same kind of metrics, but you know, at a certain point in time, there's a lot of other things that are happening with a business.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Um like what I and I and I uh what I'm personally interested in is what's kind of like the the uh ramp up to being like a true lender where you're actually underwriting a business. Because I know when you do residual portfolio purchase and sales, they're pretty simple. Yeah, you get into like an equity purchase and sale, or you're like selling assets beyond cash flow, you the level of analysis just gets way more granular. So like I would imagine you got the same thing.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you I mean you have to look at other things. Um, you know, sales model, how how are the merchants being sold? You know, are they gonna stick around? Are they on software? Are they on standard terminals? Were they sold a lease? Were they sold, you know, you have to look at the the different methodologies of how those merchants were sold uh to determine if those merchants are gonna stick around.
SPEAKER_03:How much diligence does that like? Are you interviewing people as you're because I because I've always wondered the so the first time I met Darren was uh my the first client of this firm had a heavy leasing model, and I and we we're going back to 08 or 09, maybe when you started. And I called it the smash and grab because they sold a fiction and then like gave you a savings estimate that was unachievable, right? And I didn't know this. I was like deering the headlights coming into the industry. I was like, oh, I got this great new gig, right? But I didn't really know, and I just kind of believed our client, which that's got its own pitfalls, you know, like and so you know, and I was I was pretty naive when I started the whole thing. And and I remember Darren came in to talk to him about finance because they were looking for some financing, and they had this great portfolio of merchant revenue and then also leasing revenue. But the problem was is that the way that they did the leasing is they ate up a significant amount of the savings estimate, and then people still thought they would be saving money, but um all rewards cards they downgrade to a much higher rate, and so they they were like, Well, yeah, well, you know, they never talked about the downgrade surcharge. And so, you know, I think the first time I ever met you was after a presentation to them, and on the you know, they had a lot of burn in their portfolio. I mean eventually when they sold it, it just like incinerated, like you know, and yeah, yeah. I mean, I was like, I think they sold the i3 verticals and ended up being a really bad thing for i3 verticals eventually.
SPEAKER_02:But how much did you have to learn because you were an ISO because I was an ISO, I think I I knew a lot of the ins and outs, and I had seen good ISOs and bad ISOs uh throughout the country uh for the times I was I I was working as an ISO, and so I think I I knew a lot from that. I don't think I would have gotten into the lending business had I not been an ISO.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So you I would not have lent to ISOs anyways.
SPEAKER_03:Exactly. You had enough familiarity with how everything operated to be able to understand like their revenue and their expense.
SPEAKER_02:And then understanding those savory characters and the unsavory characters in the payments business.
SPEAKER_03:Aaron Powell And how much uh investigation outside of numbers?
SPEAKER_02:Um I mean as much as you could, obviously lots of uh due diligence, background reports, you know, credit reports, things of that nature, just to see you know what what the person looks like behind the scenes. Yeah, okay. Yeah, making sure they don't have complaints with the better business bureau, making sure they don't have lawsuits against them, all that kind of stuff is super important.
SPEAKER_03:The the character of not and I don't think character of meaning like unsavory, but like the the the character of the borrower, I'm imagining because the payments industry has changed so much. Like we were just talking about this before we got on, but you know, payments is like uh like you're talking about knuckle busters, right? And then I look at today and how you know I I mean I find all software, it's ISVs are ISVs, I think, are the new ISOs. Yeah, they are, they are like you know Alan Kopelman, right? Sure. I I say this almost every time now, like, but he he said if you're not selling software, you're dead. Right, you know, and and I agree with that. Do you think in underwriting it's made it easier with the advent of technology and kind of its growth and pushing how payments is evolving versus because it used to be sales, right? Right? It used to be mom and pop. Yep. You're you're out there feet on the street meant something, and today it's just so different because your your entryway is through a strategic partner versus as much sales going on as much as integrations.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, if you sign up and you're gonna use a business management software, um you have to kind of use a processor that's integrated in there, otherwise you're double double entering every everything that you do. Well, actually one of my first referral partners when I was in ISO still was a company called Mind Body Software, and they did business management software for yoga studios, Pilates Studios, health salons, beauty salons, and things of that nature. And when we signed them up as a partner, instead of going and signing one merchant at a time, we got literally hundreds of merchants every single month of people who signed up with that software.
SPEAKER_03:And you were probably exclusive too. We were at the time, absolutely for sure. Like that's an that's actually something that's been really interesting. I was talking to one of our clients yesterday, and he's got through acquisitions, he now he has an A ACH portfolio. Okay, and it's through Nuve now.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_03:And Nuve has had to change the economics of its relationships with the ISV, which has decreased his percentage of the revenue share spore. And he doesn't, he like there, there wasn't he's not complaining, he gets it. But you know, I think one of the things that was funny is that ISVs, when when they first came into the marketplace, they were using ISOs as the entry point. Correct. And that's totally changed.
SPEAKER_02:And the ISOs were paying them, I mean, dog shit. Yeah, don't rev share. Yeah, totally. When I started with Mind Body, I think our Rev share was 10%. By the time I ended that relationship with them, they were at 90% split. Totally. They just learned the business, they learned how much value they were bringing to the proposition and said, What do we need you for? And eventually they went off on their own and became their own ISO. Yeah, and that's the kind of the same way a rep does. You know, a lot of reps start in the industry as a sales agent for an ISO and they end up becoming their own ISO.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I actually did a training because I trained, uh I was at our Florida office, and I was training the employees there that they're unfamiliar with payments or new to it to a large degree. And I was saying, you know, to understand payments today, you really have to understand kind of the the genesis and then the evolution of the service providers from ISO to super ISO FSP to uh you know uh ISV to PayFAC to what's going on and where your entry point is and how you can operate in the business. And and I I always find that to be fascinating, and I always I also think as transactions are risky, you're looking at that because you're underwriting people related to that. Right. Um the thing I've always found fascinating about what you do and what I didn't understand. So the first time I met Darren, I got out, he got out of the meeting with our client. I was asking our client what the meeting was about, they were explaining it to me, and then we were talking about you know, kind of like costs of of lending, and and and I said, Well, you know, why would you pay more? Why wouldn't you just go to a bank or this or that? And the interesting part that I learned was that the access to capital isn't there, right?
SPEAKER_02:It's not available. Like you're no, most banks don't understand a merchant portfolio and they don't understand the value of the recurring stream that's coming in every month. It's not an item you can list on your bank on your balance sheet. You know, most ISOs spend every dollar that they make. If they make ten thousand dollars a month, they spend nine thousand nine hundred and ninety dollars. Totally. If they make a hundred thousand, they spend ninety-nine thousand dollars, and so they never have any real extra cash. And if you have a hundred thousand dollar a month portfolio, that's worth probably three and a half to four million dollars. Yeah. Okay. But you can't list that on your balance sheet. A bank is not going to look at that and say, we'll loan you money off of that. And so that's hence where we come in and provide them. We know the value of those portfolios, we know how to sell the portfolio if needed, and we know how to lend against it so that uh an ISO can grow.
SPEAKER_03:Well, so that's the interesting thing to me because before we were Darren and I met just shooting the shit before we got on, and we were talking about merchant cash advances, and we've done a lot of collections work on merchant cash advances, and they're they're super predatory. I mean, and I've always wondered why people take out a merchant cash advance. And for most merchants, it's Rob and Pete Peter to pay Paul. Absolutely. That's my personal belief.
SPEAKER_02:It's they have an immediate uh concern. I mean, they have an immediate problem that they have to make. They got to make payroll, they have a bill payment that's gonna interrupt their business if they don't do it, and I think that's why they do it.
SPEAKER_03:Totally. And then they get into this cycle where it's really hard to get out of. You're not really lending to merchants, you're lending to ISOs, agents, people that have an actual portfolio that you can use as collateral. Right. But why do people come to you? And I understand for cash flow, but what is the use of the additional cash that you're providing? Like, what do you see? Because I think it's important for people to understand why the capital that you provide is important to how they can grow. Right. And actually, I mean, when I say Darren knows everybody in this industry, Darren knows almost everybody in this industry. There's not a lot of people that don't know Darren. I'm actually really happy he came down to come on this program because you bring a lot of credibility with who you are. Um and I didn't know, I mean, and I I guess I will talk about it. Darren was diagnosed with cancer a few years ago, really aggressive form of cancer, and he stopped being in the industry. And I didn't, you know, I I didn't really want to reach out because I didn't know necessarily, you know, I I didn't want to intrude. But you know, not having somebody like you, and I know Mark and and you know took it over and kind of there was still a presence, but not having you in the industry probably left a little bit of a void because you are you're a pretty big footprint.
SPEAKER_02:Right. Yeah. So uh two things. So first of all, what what do ISOs need capital for?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Number one is growth. I mean, obviously they need to grow every month, they need to write new accounts, and it costs money to bring on new business. You know, it cost a sales reps commission, you know, several hundred dollars. It costs marketing dollars. If you're doing any kind of marketing, you need to pay up front to do that. You sometimes have to buy equipment in bulk or uh buy a bunch of equipment. You're gonna give away free equipment to your clients so that they can process with you and you can earn money for many years to come. Uh sometimes they need money to open a new office. Sometimes they need money to pay base salaries so that they can bring on new people who are gonna bring them business. Um what I found a lot over the last two years is a lot of ISOs are using my money to buy back agents' residuals. I think that's smart. So a lot of a lot of guys, you can make more money without doing any additional work by just buying back some of your agents' residuals. And you can buy back a portion of them. You don't have to buy all of them. But you have a lot of, you know, a lot of ISOs have reps that started at one point and then stopped working at some point. And so those are just kind of, you know, they pay out a couple thousand dollars every month to this agent. And rather than continuing to do that, they use uh the income, you know, money for me to buy out those residuals and then make more of themselves.
SPEAKER_03:Well, and you can also get them for I mean, that's the thing that most people don't understand. Like an agent when they go to sell, there's not a marketplace for them. Right. So if they're gonna be purchased, it's gonna be purchased at a far less multiple than somebody who's upstream from them.
SPEAKER_02:So I mean if you if you're buying a portfolio from a third party, you're gonna be paying a much higher multiple than you are if you're buying them from your own guys. Yeah, for sure. So if you're an ISO and you have 30 sales reps and you can buy back, you know, a small piece of residuals from 10 of them or 20 of them, uh, you can do much better that way. Aaron Powell Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:So when you're looking at a potential borrower, are you looking at what the reason for the funding is?
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. That's one of the main questions I ask is what they're gonna use the money for. And I will counsel them if they're not using it for the right thing. I mean, I've had a lot of guys come and say, look, I want to pay off my house. And I say, well, well, what interest rate are you paying on your house? And they have 5% interest rate on their house. Okay, that's not a good use of capital. You know, a lot of them pay off credit card debt. A lot of them, you know, run up credit card debt and want to pay that off because they're making all these minimum payments and and they want to pay that off. And so I'll counsel them and only give them money if I think it's gonna be used to help grow the business, not not just pay off some bills.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. So so when you're so I guess uh and this is something that you told me before, like how much consulting are you doing with the borrower's postfunding?
SPEAKER_02:So I I kind of become a coach. You know, if I if I loan money to somebody, I want them to be successful. Number one, I want them to be able to pay me back. But number two, I want them to be successful and grow. And so I'll give them as much, typically as much coaching as they'd like. I'm kind of sitting on the sideline and I'm watching what they're doing and I'm seeing their deal counts and I'm there to counsel them. I mean, I've been through every aspect of being an ISO. I started as a one-man show working out of my garage in the early 90s, selling deals myself, door to door, just like every most people that have gotten into the business, to running, you know, an office running 4,000 deals a month and having sales agents all across the country. So I've had an a huge experience over the last 35 years of writing merchant accounts and understanding the business. And so I think I can bring a expertise to people that are, you know, typically a one-man show and they don't have anybody to bounce ideas off of. Hey, I'm thinking about trying this marketing method, or hey, I'm thinking about going after a referral partner. How do I do that? And so I feel like I give you know every client at least a couple of hours of consulting and coaching as to what I think they should do to help increase their business. I let them tell me everything they're doing and I give them suggestions, and some of them take the suggestions and some of them don't, but you know, I try to do as much as I can to help them be successful.
SPEAKER_03:Aaron Powell Are you doing ongoing portfolio analysis?
SPEAKER_02:No, that I'm not doing. I'm kind of looking at high-level numbers. I'm not digging deep unless they ask me to dig deep. Got it. You know, if they ask me, say, hey, I really want you to look at what I'm doing here. You know, I had I did a two-hour call with uh one of my clients last week, and you know, he was complaining that his his you know he wasn't making any profits. He was you know breaking even basically. And I went through his payroll reports with him. I learned about his pay structures and how he was paying his sales reps and his sales managers and office people, and I looked at how many deals he was writing a month and told him, look, you're you're you have too much overhead here based on the number of deals you're doing. You know, he had three people in customer service, but he's writing five deals a month. I mean, how do you justify paying three salaries when you're writing five deals a month?
SPEAKER_03:No, I get you on that. My my question is uh another one that I would have is in and do you find opportunities to cash these people out sometimes? Um I help connect them with uh with other people.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, absolutely. So I have clients of mine that that do nothing but buy portfolios, and I provide the financing for that. So I have you know a gentleman back in New York who's bought probably nine portfolios, and I've provided the financing for every single one of those. And so I will connect. So if I have another client that says, hey, I'm interested in selling, I can connect them with you know clients, other clients of mine that I know are buyers and active buyers. You know, when when you have a buyer, they're sometimes interested in only a Pfizer portfolio or only a XYZ portfolio. And so, you know, you got to connect the right people uh with at the right time.
SPEAKER_03:That's awesome. That's awesome. Like that's I I find so you know, when I started in this, I I did a lot more on the litigation side because it was kind of what I was trained with when I first came in. But I've totally transitioned into contracts and MA, and that's primarily what I do. And anything I do on litigation is more strategy at this point. Uh-huh. But I find what you do fascinating because randomly, like I if you had told me I would have been in numbers, I would have laughed at you. Like, my grandfather was a uh uh president of a regional bank in Michigan. My dad's been a tax guy for 35 years and does international tax, and I'm a lawyer that focuses on payment processing, which I think is really random through the generations. You know, we've all sort of focused on numbers, but when I get into uh the the due diligence of a transaction, I'm forced to have a knowledge base that I don't necessarily have. But I find what you do to be fascinating to actually um understand risk.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, well, what what I really liked about when I first got in the business was learning about all the different types of businesses that are out there and how people make money off so many things. It's fascinating, right? Yeah, and that was the interesting part for me was going out to see a new merchant, learning what they did for a living, learning what their profit margins were, learning how they got customers. That's the that was the interesting thing for me was learning about all those businesses. And now I can take that knowledge and use that in my business when I talk to an ISO and you know, learning about their business and educating myself on what they do differently than everybody else and what their specialty might be. And so that's the part I enjoy is is learning about what other people do.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I mean, I I I say this on the podcast with Jared too. Like, I'm not much of like being a lawyer, like I don't personify with being a lawyer. Right. Um, if you met me uh at a bar on a Saturday night, you'd have no fucking clue of what I do. Um but I think the thing that keeps me coming back here every day that when I do retire, I don't know what I'll do with myself to a certain degree. Is I learn every day. Right. I mean, even in this podcast, I'm learning because I sit and I listen and I I you get to sit in this cat bird seat that is really interesting because you do, you get to like watch what other people are doing and see what's successful and what may not be successful and maybe adopt some of it for your own. And yeah, I I think that's fascinating to be able to have that opportunity. Having access to people that are in business and that's their primary function. Right. I think dude, attorneys are horrible business people, they just are by nature. And I think it's because a lot of them aren't really exposed to business people.
SPEAKER_02:Right. I think ISOs are a lot of, you know, a lot of ISOs are great salespeople. I mean, they can go out to any merchant and sell a merchant, look at what equipment they have, look at how they're going to process, show them how to save money. But a lot of them are not great business people. They don't understand the rest of the business involved, you know, financing, PLs, balance sheets, you know, all all, you know, getting capital for their business. They don't know how to do that.
SPEAKER_03:Aaron Powell, did you take any sort of um like formal instruction, or was it just like I went a year and a half to college and dropped out to start the business. So all of your knowledge about how business finance and and and you know business accounting, these are things that you just picked up in the trailer.
SPEAKER_04:Self-taught, absolutely. That's awesome. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I really enjoy that. I mean that so like I said, you've been at you were you were gone for a little while, you're back, which I was happy to see when I saw you at Phoenix.
SPEAKER_02:I am happy to share. I, you know, I in uh 2018 I uh passed out two times uh during uh you know normal activities, and one of the times I hit the floor, and so I went to the hospital and they did an MRI on my head and found out I had a brain tumor and brain cancer. Um pretty scary time in my life, obviously. Um initial diagnosis was I had the worst brain tumor type in the world, which is called a glioblastoma, told me that I would probably die within six to twelve months. And so obviously um had to have brain surgery, uh, went and got multiple opinions on you know what my diagnosis was and what my treatment plans were going to be, and realized that I needed to do, you know, I had to take off work. I obviously couldn't work anymore. And so I actually was off from 2020 to kind of 2023. I didn't I didn't do any new loans uh at Super G. Um, I kind of put the business on kind of hold. I uh didn't do any new loans, obviously had to still service my existing customers that were there, but you know, I thought I was gonna just, you know, not not be able to come back to work. And so I did four years of immunotherapy treatments, uh, which worked very well for me and didn't have any uh any problems during the four years. Um I was going to the hospital twice a month, getting IVs, getting uh, you know, treatments, uh, and that was a pretty scary time. But um I I can't even imagine able to get through that in twenty twenty three my brain tumor started growing back again. I had to then do some new treatments. Uh Um which I ended up doing eleven rounds of chemo. Um that seemed to stop my tumor in its tracks. And so uh today I'm considered what's considered stable. You know, brain tumors always grow back.
SPEAKER_04:They stable away. Maybe stable stable just means I'm okay right now.
SPEAKER_02:I have to do uh MRI every three months and check on myself and make sure I'm okay. But um, you know, it's gonna be a lifelong thing I'm gonna have to manage and uh and treat. Uh but uh yeah.
SPEAKER_03:I mean what you had is uh and I don't uh people can go look it up. It's the most aggressive form of cancer, I I believe.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, brain cancer is a pretty scary, pretty scary thing, you know. Luckily, I I believe my brain tumor was in a good spot. It all depends on the location on where it is, and I haven't suffered any of the things that a lot of other people that I've met that have brain tumors. Just cognitive, just cognitive. You don't have you know, some people lose you know feeling on one side of their body, they can't move one side of their body, um, they can't remember things. Um luckily I haven't experienced most of those symptoms and I haven't had a really good treatment team. My doctors have been you know excellent, and uh, you know, I really uh appreciate everything they've done for me.
SPEAKER_03:So well, no, I I apologize, I didn't mean to cut you off. Yeah, no. But I I was stoked to see you in in in Phoenix because I've done in five years. I know I was surprised to see you. Yeah, you know, I mean I know I'd emailed with you a couple of times, but I was surprised to see you there. I was like, oh fuck, Darren's here. And then John was there, which was great too. Yeah. Um, and I guess the question that I was trying to get to was as your restart has happened, uh-huh, anything different?
SPEAKER_02:No, pretty much the same. I mean, my phone was ringing during during the time that I was off, but I just wasn't taking calls and wasn't doing anything. But no, kind of rebooted back up doing the exact same thing, same, you know, same company, same everything. I just started doing new loans again, and uh, you know, my existing customers started calling me back, and people who needed funding uh found out I was back in business, and and here we are. It's great, man. Yeah, I'm sure super happy to be back because I'm happy sitting around doing nothing is is not fun.
SPEAKER_03:No, I know I'm with you. I I I like I said, when I I don't know what retire would mean. Like, you know, my dad turned 76 in a couple months, and that dude, I I don't see him, I don't foresee him stopping working. Yeah to my stepmom's chagrin, but like I just don't see it. So but well look, I always let um did is there anything that you like you wanted to talk about that we didn't talk about? And I always give our guests the last word.
SPEAKER_02:No, just you know, just let you know, let viewers know that you know, Super G Capital's here to provide loans anywhere from a hundred thousand dollars to up to five million dollars per per client. You know, I provide the financing over twelve to forty-eight months. I work out, you know, payment plans for them to uh to help grow their business, and you know, we're we're here and available.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I I I will say um beyond beyond Darren just being a really good guy, which I think you're a really good guy, I do. I I've always gotten a feeling from you that um you know sometimes you you sit outside of it now. I feel like I'm on the inside of payments, but like for a long time I felt like I was kind of on the periphery of it. And um you're always really friendly and cordial, and like just an I mean, I think because you're from Southern California too, it probably helps a little. Um but I I think one of the things that I do most in my day these days is consult and just give people advice. Right. I will tell you if you're out there and you're listening to this, you're not gonna get much better advice from anyone than you would from Darren, and not just in finance, but ops. The guy ran an ISO, he sees ISOs. I I I would encourage you if you had a reason for financing, just a conversation with Darren will probably go a long way. So I appreciate that. Yeah, oh of course, man. I I appreciate you being here. Yeah, no problem. Thank you. Okay, man.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Excellent. Uh Darren, where can people find you?
SPEAKER_02:Um, you can come to my website, uh www.supergcapital.com. It's probably the easiest way.
SPEAKER_00:Excellent. And we'll have all the information down below. Thank you for listening this long to the Payments Experts Podcast, a podcast of Global Legal Law Firm. We've had a very special guest in today, Darren Gidzberg with Super G Capital, as well as our managing partner of the law firm, Christopher Dryden. Gentlemen, it was a great one. We appreciate it, and we'll see you on the next one. Bye. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Payments Experts Podcast, a podcast of Global Legal Law Firm. Visit us online today at Global Legalaw.com. Matters discussed are all opinions that do not constitute legal advice. All events or likeness to real people, and events is a coincidence.