Global payments are still draining businesses in ways many leaders do not fully see until margins disappear, cash flow tightens, or expansion stalls. Hristian Drensky, CEO of MoreFin, argues that the real problem is not just processing payments, but operating them with enough visibility and control to stop leakage before it becomes normalized.
Most global businesses are losing money in payments long before they realize it. On the Disruption Interruption podcast, host Karla Jo Helms (KJ) interviews Hristian Drensky, CEO of MoreFin, about why international payment operations have become a black hole of hidden costs, delayed visibility, and preventable inefficiencies. In the episode, “Turning ‘Lost Money’ into a Growth Engine with Hristian Drensky,” Drensky explains that companies are often “flying blind” for 30 days at a time, waiting to learn whether they were overcharged, underpaid, or exposed to risk they could have caught much earlier.
Drensky puts it plainly: “Those conversions hit your top line, they hit your bottom line, so they’re really causing inefficiency in the operations.” He argues that the real danger is not just the fee itself, but the delay in seeing it. By the time many businesses reconcile what happened, the damage is already done and the next cycle of transactions is underway.
Why Industry Still Runs Blind
The deeper problem, Drensky argues, is that too many businesses still treat payments like a back-office utility instead of a growth-critical operating system. The true costs go far beyond the advertised rate, and when companies wait 30 days or more for reconciliation, they are not just slow, they are operating without the visibility needed to protect cash flow, recover losses, or fix inefficiencies in time.
That problem gets worse as companies expand across borders. Many businesses stitch together processors, banks, BI tools, and local providers without a standard way to unify the data. The result is a patchwork of systems that makes it difficult to see what is due, what is being held in reserve, where losses are occurring, and which local payment or fraud risks apply in each market. Instead of running a coherent payment operation, companies are often managing a fragmented network of vendors, reports, and delayed signals.
The industry is also being outpaced by regions that did not inherit as much legacy infrastructure. Parts of Asia and Africa moved faster by building tech-first payment ecosystems, while the US and Europe remain tied to older rails, slower bank transfers, and fragmented workflows. Drensky points to Africa as an example, where “telecoms absorbed the role of banks,” making M-Pesa “one of the most advanced payment ecosystem” through a mobile-carrier model that was not held back by the same regulatory framework. In that light, the problem is no longer access to payment technology. It is the failure of mature markets to move beyond outdated infrastructure and operating habits.
The Bet on What Comes Next
Drensky’s approach is to rethink payments as a unified system rather than a collection of vendors. MoreFin’s model combines payment orchestration, automated reconciliation, compliance operations, and expert guidance into a single managed ecosystem designed to give companies real-time visibility and faster control over cash flow.
That solution is also tied to a broader operating philosophy: automation should replace repetitive work before companies default to more headcount. MoreFin operates with a lean team of 26 people by automating repeatable tasks, reflecting Drensky’s belief that scale comes from smarter systems, not just larger teams. In his view, companies expanding internationally do not need more fragmented payment tools, they need a payment engine that gives them daily clarity, local expertise, and tighter operational control. As Drensky puts it, “You can get the money instantly, reconcile, automate the whole process with some modern providers, or keep your old bank just because you used it for 20 years”.
Hristian Drensky is a global fintech executive focused on turning payments into a competitive advantage. With more than 18 years in payments, fraud prevention, and regulatory technology, he has worked at the intersection of financial infrastructure, compliance, and digital growth, helping businesses navigate the operational complexity of global commerce. As CEO of MoreFin, he leads a platform built to help digital businesses scale internationally, reconcile daily, and stay compliant with confidence. His mission is to transform payments from a hidden source of leakage into one of the digital economy’s most powerful growth engines. At MoreFin, Drensky has positioned the company around a more integrated model for payment operations combining orchestration, reconciliation, compliance, and expert support in a single ecosystem.
Karla Jo Helms is the Chief Evangelist and Anti-PR® Strategist for JOTO PR Disruptors™. Karla Jo learned firsthand how unforgiving business can be when millions of dollars are on the line — and how the control of public opinion often determines whether one company is happily chosen, or another is brutally rejected. Being an alumnus of crisis management, Karla Jo has worked with litigation attorneys, private investigators, and the media to help restore companies of goodwill into the good graces of public opinion — Karla Jo operates on the ethic of getting it right the first time, not relying on second chances and doing what it takes to excel. Helms speaks globally on public relations, how the PR industry itself has lost its way, and how, in the right hands, corporations can harness the power of Anti-PR to drive markets and impact market perception.
