The 45/45/5/5 Commission Split Explained
If you've spent any time around trade finance brokerage, you've seen the numbers "45/45/5/5" attached to a deal and may have nodded along without anyone ever explaining where they come from. It's one of those conventions the industry uses constantly and documents rarely. So here's the plain explanation: what the split means, who gets each slice, why it's structured that way, and — the part that actually matters — how to make sure the share with your name on it reaches your account. The split applies the same way regardless of which instrument the deal is built on — SBLC, DLC, or MT103.
What the numbers mean
The 45/45/5/5 split divides the commission pool of a deal — not the deal value, the commission portion — among the four intermediary roles in a standard two-sided transaction:
- 45% — Sender-side broker
- 45% — Receiver-side broker
- 5% — Sender-side mandate
- 5% — Receiver-side mandate
The two brokers — the intermediaries who actually source and connect the two sides of the deal — take the lion's share, split evenly between them. The two mandates — who represent the principals in a more formal, appointed capacity — take a smaller slice each. It adds up to 100% of the commission pool, balanced symmetrically between the two sides of the transaction.
The key conceptual point: this is a split of the fee, after the commission rate itself has been agreed. The commission rate (what the intermediary layer earns in total, often expressed as a percentage of the deal or a fixed amount per unit) is a separate number. 45/45/5/5 just describes how that agreed pool is carved up among the players.
Why brokers and mandates are paid differently
The asymmetry between the 45% broker shares and the 5% mandate shares reflects different roles, not seniority:
Brokers carry the deal. They source counterparties, make the introductions, hold the relationships, and absorb the risk of being circumvented. They're the ones who found the deal and put it together, so they earn the larger share.
Mandates represent a principal. A mandate is formally appointed by a principal (via a mandate letter) to act on their behalf in the transaction. Their role is more representational than originative — they're inside one party's camp rather than bridging the two — so the convention compensates them at a lower rate.
The symmetry across the two sides (sender vs receiver) reflects the reality that both sides of a deal need representation and both sides did work to bring their principal to the table.
Why it's a convention, not a rule
Here's the important caveat: 45/45/5/5 is a common default, not a law. It's a starting point that reflects a typical two-broker, two-mandate structure. Real deals vary:
- A deal with only one broker, or with additional intermediaries in the chain, needs a different split.
- The percentages are negotiable; some chains run 40/40/10/10, or weight one side more heavily, or add a slice for a facilitator who introduced the brokers to each other.
- The total commission rate and the split are agreed deal by deal.
So treat 45/45/5/5 as the industry's sensible default — the structure most deals start from — while knowing the actual numbers are whatever the parties agree and lock into the IMFPA.
The part that actually matters: making the split stick
Knowing your percentage is the easy bit. Getting it paid is where trade finance brokers routinely get burned, and a clean-looking split on paper protects no one by itself. The split becomes real only when three things are true:
It's locked into the IMFPA before the deal advances. The commission structure belongs in the Irrevocable Master Fee Protection Agreement, fixed and signed before the deal reaches the bank stage. If your 45% is still "to be confirmed" while the principals move toward issuance, you're exposed. Lock it early or risk not locking it at all. (See what is an IMFPA for why placement in the sequence is everything.)
It's tied to verified identities. A split is only as good as your certainty about who's on the other end of it. If the parties in the chain were never properly verified, your locked percentage points at someone you can't actually hold to it. Verification is the foundation the whole split rests on.
It's released by a neutral paymaster. The split should be executed mechanically by a neutral party who pays all four shares simultaneously when the deal closes — not routed through one broker who's supposed to pass on the others' cuts, and not left to a principal's goodwill. (See how a paymaster works.) Without a neutral paymaster, the broker who receives the pool controls whether anyone else gets paid.
Miss any of these and the split is just a number in a document. Circumvention, disputes over which version was agreed, and paymasters who don't pay are the everyday ways a "locked" 45/45/5/5 evaporates. We cover the full landscape of these failures in why trade finance deals fall apart.
The bottom line
45/45/5/5 is the trade finance industry's default carve-up of the commission pool: 45% to each of the two brokers who built the deal, 5% to each of the two mandates who represent the principals, balanced across both sides. It's a sensible starting convention, freely negotiable, and — on its own — completely unenforceable.
What turns your share from a number into money is structure: the split locked into the IMFPA before the deal advances, tied to verified identities, and released by a neutral paymaster at closing. That's precisely what Dealexus is built to enforce. The platform lets the parties set the split (45/45/5/5 or whatever they negotiate), locks it before the bank stage, ties it to verified identities, and releases each share automatically at closing through a neutral paymaster. Your cut stops depending on everyone choosing to honour it.
Enter the terminal to see how commission splits are locked and paid.
This article is educational and does not constitute legal or financial advice.