Exchange clearing account

The stock exchange clearing account (BVK) is an account on which the direct debits and credits from the payment transactions of the Deutsche Geldkarte are settled for all cash cards issued by a bank.

When the money card is topped up, the cardholder's card account is debited and the amount is simultaneously credited to the stock exchange clearing account. The cash card transactions are initially saved on the acceptance terminal after the payment processes and are only submitted to the clearing offices (registration centers) after the (mostly daily) cash register cut. The registration centers determine the sums of the submitted money card transactions every working day, debit the stock exchange clearing accounts and credit them to the merchant accounts.

The stock exchange clearing account is often confused with the shadow balance or is misleadingly referred to as the "shadow account". A shadow balance is kept for each money card, which reflects the current money value of the money card. If the money card is defective, this amount can be credited back to the card account. In contrast, the stock exchange clearing account reflects the sum of the money loaded onto all money cards of an institution and does not store any card information.