I don’t see negative carryover as “stealing”. In fact strictly speaking to provide balance to both parties, earnings should be aggregated over the lifetime of a player (average 5/6 months). This is effectively what negative carryover does, but because it doesn’t work on a player-by-player basis and one winner can affect earnings from other players, despite ensuring a monthly dividend to affiliates, it’s too risky a proposition. And even if it was on a player by player basis, no affiliate would wait that long to receive their earnings. So the most accurate method is unworkable, hence why we have this compromise.
Like any business, an affiliate needs to spread their risk. Given all things are equal, it makes no sense to give priority to a casino with negative carryover when you can push one that doesn’t and reduce the financial risk substantially. So I don’t go down that road unless the casino a) allows me to run multiple affiliate accounts and spread the players around (normally one account per website in my case) and b) will agree to wipe out big hits if they aren’t cleared by the end of the following month. This goes some way to redressing the balance, although it’s still not as attractive as no neg.
On a similar note but a little off-topic, affiliates should take the “spread the risk” philosphy and apply it to all casinos they promote. Sticking with one or two casinos at the top of the page ad infinitum because you “always do well there” is setting yourself up for trouble down the line. Better to spread the players around different casinos at different groups. Short term losses should mean long term gains. It’s better to have 50 casinos making $1,000 than 5 casinos making $10,000 if you’re here for the long term – you’ll weather the storms far easier 