About 21 brands, including Apex Trader Funding, Tradeify, Lucid Trading, Goat Funded Trader, FundingPips and Blue Guardian, have ended their partnerships with Prop Firm Match since the first exits were announced on Friday, 30 October. The comparison platform, which has 38 prop firm partners as of press time after shedding almost two dozen brands, acknowledged that clicks on firm profiles and promo codes on its site opened partner websites through its affiliate links. The scale of the exits raises a question across the prop trading industry: how did the firms paying the commissions not spot it sooner?
London’s trading industry is coming home!
A statement from the platform on X said: “This should not have happened. We take full responsibility for it.” The company said it has contacted each partner to review the matter and reconcile any inaccuracies. Prop Firm Match is expected to release another update later today (Monday).
Three years ago, Prop Firm Match launched. Two traders saw a gap in the market for a platform providing simplicity and transparency for prop firm traders. We developed new features not seen before: verified reviews, payout tracking across all payment methods, live spreads, rule overviews, simple ways to compare prop firms, and prop firm expos.
Three years in, PFM has had over 25M website visits, reached over 370,000 members, and has given out free challenge accounts worth over $1,400,000 to the PFM community. Over 100 firms apply to be listed each year and go through one of the industry’s most rigorous compliance processes.
We also got something wrong. Until yesterday, when someone clicked on a firm or a code on our site, a new tab would open the firm’s site through our affiliate link. This should not have happened. We take full responsibility for it. We have reached out to each of our partners to review this together and reconcile any inaccuracies. We respect any decisions firms have made based on this.
We truly appreciate the partners and traders who value the relationship we have built together over the years. We promise you that we will learn from this, hold ourselves to the highest standard, and come back stronger and better.
— Prop Firm Match (@PropFirmMatch) October 31, 2026
A source close to the matter said the misattributed sales would have been difficult for partner firms to spot because they looked identical to legitimate affiliate referrals. Attribution relied on tracking cookies whose lifespan each firm set for itself, ranging from a few hours to several months.
According to the source, the cookies were triggered before users had committed to a purchase. A trader drawn in by a firm’s own advertising could later buy directly from that firm, and the commission would still be credited to Prop Firm Match. With the major firms spending heavily on marketing, the source said, such cases were common and blended into normal affiliate traffic.
Read more: Prop Firms Drop Prop Firm Match over Affiliate Link Allegations
The commercial terms between the platform and its partners are not uniform. Some firms were affiliates, paying commission on challenges sold through Prop Firm Match links and codes, an arrangement the platform’s website discloses. Topstep founder and CEO Michael Patak, meanwhile, said his firm had no affiliate code and instead paid $10,000 a month for a listing, with a best rank of sixth. The platform’s published policy says no firm can buy a ranking.
fyi – we are dropping Prop firm Match.. we didn’t have a code and we paid them $10k a month to list us (best rank we got was 6th place.. i heard 1st cost $100k/m) … now we save $10k a month… time to have a @TopstepTV Fire Drill (thats where we give away stuff on tv) .. we got an extra $10,000 a month in our budget!! Let go!
— mp (@MichaelPatak) October 30, 2026
Three days after the scandal surfaced, big brands, including FTMO, T5ers, FundedNext and E8 Markets are still listed on the prop firm comparison website.
A Redirect That Looked Like Routine Traffic
A video posted on Thursday, 29 October by Trader Kane, who runs rival comparison site Prop Firm Compare, showed the behaviour. Clicking a firm profile or copy code button on Prop Firm Match opened the requested page in a new tab while the original tab went through an affiliate link. Kane said this happens on “most firms listed on their website” and that he had not checked them all.
Are we still on the “deceitful marketing algo”? Hey @PropFirmMatch, did you knowingly push an update that stuffs cookies when people aren’t clicking links advertised in the code as external websites?
Here’s what happens: someone clicks the profile page or copy code link that links to the internal page and your javascript handler redirects the original tab through an affiliate link to the firm’s website and opens the intended link a new tab… sounds pretty knowing to me.
You even ban your affiliates from forcing cookies.. but you can, huh?
Some pretty big affiliates have gone to prison for cookie stuffing.
I used @MattLeech’s MFFU as an example in this video but this happens on most firms listed on their website (I didn’t check them all).
Firms are banning traders for deceitful marketing, if this isn’t deceitful what is?
— kane🧪 (@traderkane) October 29, 2026
An Internet Archive review of the platform’s JavaScript by Alex Firdaus found the copy code function sending the original tab to affiliate URLs in every capture from 30 November 2025 to 24 October 2026. Firdaus is head of media at FinMedia Group and editor-in-chief of FundedTrading.com, which competes with Prop Firm Match.
According to the analysis, the code fired once per firm per day, tracked in the browser’s local storage, which would explain why repeat tests appeared normal. The archive does not show how many traders the redirect reached or whether any firm paid commission because of it, the analysis states. Finance Magnates has not independently verified it.
The allegation differs from classic cookie stuffing in how the tracking link fires. In cookie stuffing, as Firdaus describes it, an affiliate cookie is set without any click, usually on page load. Here, users clicked a firm profile or copy code button, and the affiliate link loaded in the original tab while the requested page opened in a new one. Firdaus calls this a forced click. Whether it breaches a firm’s terms depends on how its affiliate agreement defines a click, he said.
Partner Responses and the Precedents on the Books
Exits came with short statements. Apex Trader Funding said it had “terminated its affiliate relationship with Prop Firm Match, effective immediately” after a review of referral tracking practices, without saying what the review found. Tradeify said referrals to its site “broke our affiliate terms” and that Prop Firm Match will no longer sponsor the Premier Trading League. Goat Funded Trader also cited a review. “We do not compromise on transparency, accurate attribution, or responsible marketing,” it said.
On X, Khaled of FundingPips wrote: “We have caught the cookies practices in August.” He said the firm took action, and that its ranking on the platform then fell from number one best seller to number ten. He added that the firm is forfeiting the month’s commissions and will pursue financial claims.
Effective immediately @PropFirmMatch affiliate partnership is terminated.
All their commissions for the month are forfeited, and financial claims are going to be pursued.
We have caught the cookies practices in August, took actions on it and Our rank dropped from Nr. 1 best seller to Nr.10.
Plus being told that traders picking us over other firms costs them money, which I understand since their commission is same as any other affiliate.
Since the beginning we have supported them, tech, expertise and features, yet that business grew into something I personally don’t believe in.
Adios 👊🏽
— Khaled (@Khldfx) October 30, 2026
In November 2025, Finance Magnates reported that Prop Firm Match delisted PipFarm after an extensive review, having earlier suspended or delisted firms including True Forex Funds and The Funded Trader. CEO Martin Jensen said at the time: “I’d rather be criticized for requesting too much than too little.” The platform then said its site drew more than 1.2 million monthly visits. In its latest statement, it cited more than 25 million visits and 370,000 members in three years.
This article was written by Arnab Shome at www.financemagnates.com.Retail FXRead More
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