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Prop Firm Match has lost about 21 brand partners after its comparison pages triggered affiliate tracking when visitors opened a firm's profile or used a promo code. The departures began to emerge on Friday, 30 October 2026. Apex Trader Funding, Tradeify, Lucid Trading, Goat Funded Trader, FundingPips and Blue Guardian are among the firms that have left. The platform had 38 prop firm partners on 2 November 2026.
The behaviour involved two browser actions: the page or code requested by a visitor opened in a fresh tab, while the original tab passed through the firm's affiliate URL. That could credit Prop Firm Match for a sale even where the user later purchased directly from the firm. A source familiar with the matter said the resulting referrals could resemble ordinary affiliate sales in partner reporting.
Prop Firm Match said it had contacted partners to examine the issue and settle any attribution errors. The company accepted responsibility in a statement on X and said it respected firms' decisions about the relationship.
It expected to provide another update later on Monday, 2 November 2026. The scale of any affected sales, and whether commission was paid on them, has not been established.
How the redirect and tracking worked
Reports and technical analysis describe several parts of the referral path:
- Trader Kane, who operates rival comparison site Prop Firm Compare, posted a video on Thursday, 29 October 2026. It showed a firm profile or copy-code control opening the intended destination in a new tab as the original tab went through an affiliate URL. Kane said the behaviour applied to most firms listed, though he had not tested every one.
- Alex Firdaus reviewed archived JavaScript from Prop Firm Match. The captures he examined, covering 30 November 2025 to 24 October 2026, showed the copy-code action sending the original tab to affiliate URLs. Firdaus is head of media at FinMedia Group and editor-in-chief of FundedTrading.com, a competing publication and comparison business.
- Firdaus's analysis said the browser stored a record of the action in local storage, limiting it to one firing per firm per day. That could account for why repeated checks did not always reproduce the redirect. The archived material cannot establish the number of visitors affected or whether partner firms paid commission as a result; the report has not independently verified the analysis.
- The distinction matters for contract review. Firdaus contrasted the behaviour with cookie stuffing, where an affiliate cookie is placed without a user click, often when a page loads. In this case, visitors did click a profile or code control, but the affiliate-tracking action was separate from the destination they sought. He described it as a forced click and said whether it violated a firm's terms turns on the agreement's definition of a click.
Partners respond and history matters
Departing firms have given different explanations. Apex Trader Funding said it ended its affiliate relationship immediately after reviewing referral tracking, without detailing the review's findings. Tradeify said the referrals breached its affiliate terms and that Prop Firm Match would no longer sponsor the Premier Trading League. Goat Funded Trader pointed to its own review.
FundingPips said it had identified the cookie practice in August, took action and then saw its platform position move from number one best seller to number ten. It said it would forfeit the month's commissions and pursue financial claims.
Not every commercial arrangement used a commission code. Topstep founder and CEO Michael Patak said his firm had no affiliate code, instead paying $10,000 a month for a listing, with sixth place its highest ranking. He added that he had heard first place cost $100k/m. Prop Firm Match's published policy says firms cannot buy rankings. FTMO, T5ers, FundedNext and E8 Markets were still on the comparison site three days after the issue surfaced.
The exits and responses were reported by Finance Magnates. The dispute follows earlier listing decisions.
In November 2025, Prop Firm Match delisted PipFarm after a review, having previously suspended or removed True Forex Funds and The Funded Trader. CEO Martin Jensen said at the time that he would rather be criticised for requesting too much than too little. The platform then reported more than 1.2 million monthly visits; its latest statement cites over 25M visits and over 370,000 members over three years, as well as free challenge accounts worth over $1,400,000. It also says more than 100 firms apply for a listing each year and are assessed through its compliance process.
What this means on the desk
For partner operations teams, the immediate work is to reconcile affiliate reports against the tracking terms and referral records they hold. The source does not establish how many visits or commissions were affected. Firms will need to determine whether their own logs can identify the relevant referral path, what their agreements define as a qualifying click, and whether any commission adjustment is warranted.
Platform operators should check the complete browser flow, not only the destination tab visible to a tester. Does opening a profile or copying a code also invoke a tracking URL in another tab? Does the behaviour vary by firm or by repeat visit? The reported use of local storage makes test history relevant, so a clean browser state may be needed to reproduce the path.
For firms still listed, the questions are whether their agreement permits this attribution method, how long their cookies remain active, and what evidence they need to approve or dispute commissions. Prop Firm Match has said it is reviewing the matter with partners. The outcome will depend on those checks and any revised attribution records, neither of which the platform has yet detailed.
