Presumably, it was intended by the developers of vB to form the basis of some sort of reward system, however, to the best of my knowledge, no such system is in place here. As it stands now, the Referrals counter is just window dressing; I do not know if Ron has future plans to implement such a system or not. Currently, the only rewards system in place of which I am aware are the benefits from Cafe membership, which qualifies members for discounts from certain vendors, among other benefits.