Prop Firm Match Says Its Affiliate Redirect Ran Since October 2025 and Estimates a Low Single-Digit Impact

What happened

Prop Firm Match (opens in new tab) (PFM) has published the first findings of its internal review into the affiliate redirect that traders and prop firms raised last week. The new statement page (opens in new tab), revised 2 November, gives more detail than PFM's 31 October post (opens in new tab), which we covered in our 1 November story. PFM also posted a shorter version on X (opens in new tab) at 22:29 UTC on 2 November.

What Prop Firm Match now says happened

In PFM's own words, from its statement page:

> "From October 2025, clicking "Copy Code" or "Buy" for a firm on our website opened the page the trader chose in a new tab, and sent the original tab through that firm's affiliate link. From March 2026, this functionality also applied to clicks on a firm's name and logo in some sections of our website."

• Dates. PFM says it disabled the feature for all firms on 29 October and removed the code from its live site on 31 October. It says it has preserved the records.
• How it worked. The new wording matches what trader Kane (@traderkane (opens in new tab)) showed in his 29 October video: the page you chose opened in a new tab, and the tab you left went through the affiliate link. PFM's 31 October post had described it the other way round, saying that "a new tab would open the firm's site through our affiliate link".
• Timing. PFM puts the start at October 2025, with firm names and logos added in March 2026. An archive analysis by Alex Firdaus (opens in new tab) of FundedTrading.com, a competing site, found the code in PFM's archived JavaScript from 30 November 2025 to 24 October 2026, extended to internal firm links from April 2026. The two accounts differ by a few weeks on each date. Finance Magnates says (opens in new tab) it has not independently verified that analysis.

What PFM says it has established so far

PFM lists these findings "based on the technical assessment and data reviewed by our development and analytics teams to date":

• It "did not operate without a user-initiated click".
• It "opened only the affiliate link of the firm the trader selected".
• It "did not involve hidden iframes or invisible pixels".
• It ran only in PFM's own website code, not on partner firms' websites.
• It "did not change the prices traders paid or the discounts they received".
• If a trader later clicked another affiliate's link or used another affiliate's code, "under most of the attribution models reviewed", the sale would go to that last click or code.

PFM's estimate of the impact

PFM says its first review covers the 46 partner firms integrated with TrackNow, for purchases between 1 June and 29 October 2026. Its "early, modelled estimate" is that the potential effect on referral attribution is "a low single-digit percentage of the commissions Prop Firm Match earned from most firms", with differences between firms.

These are preliminary figures. PFM hasn't published how many clicks, traders or sales were affected, or any amount in dollars. It says it is still checking partners that aren't on TrackNow and the months before June 2026.

What PFM says it has changed

• Traders now reach a firm's site from PFM through a labelled checkout panel or promo panel. PFM says these panels show, before you continue, when it may earn a commission.
• For firms without a PFM affiliate agreement, PFM says the panel shows a neutral notice and uses no affiliate link.
• Clicking a firm's name or logo, or copying a MATCH code, "no longer opens the firm's website or any partner link", according to PFM's FAQ.
• PFM says it will tell partners in advance about future changes that materially affect how referrals reach them.

PFM says it will invite every firm it has worked with, including firms that have ended their partnership, to compare its findings with their own records. Where a wrong attribution is verified, it says it will agree with that firm how to address it "taking into account the applicable affiliate arrangements". It hasn't said whether that means refunds. It says MATCH codes, discounts and loyalty points work as before, and that it "continues to operate as normal".

Where things stand

• Firms. Finance Magnates reported (opens in new tab) on 2 November that about 21 brands had ended partnerships with PFM since 30 October, and that PFM had 38 prop firm partners left at press time. Firms that announced exits on their own X accounts include Apex Trader Funding, Blue Guardian, Goat Funded Trader, Alpha Capital Group, Tradeify, Funded Futures Family and Finotive Funding, as listed in our 1 November story.
• Listings. FX News Group (opens in new tab) noted that the statement doesn't address how PFM's rankings and paid listings work. That question was raised when Topstep CEO Michael Patak said on X that Topstep paid PFM $10,000 a month to be listed. PFM's statement doesn't mention it.
• Reaction. Prop Radar, a competing comparison site, published a line-by-line response (opens in new tab) on 3 November. It said the statement doesn't explain why the redirect fired only once per firm per day, how many traders it reached, or what affiliates who referred traders first may have lost. Under last-click attribution, Prop Radar argues, the redirect could take credit from an affiliate who sent the trader earlier.
• Trustpilot. PFM's Trustpilot page (opens in new tab) shows the warning "This company's rating is unavailable due to a breach of our guidelines", along with the note "We've removed a number of fake reviews for this company". Trustpilot doesn't say when the reviews were removed or who posted them. We saw the warning on 3 November.

PFM says it will keep updating its statement page (opens in new tab) as the review continues. We'll update this story when it publishes final figures, or when firms report what they found in their own records.

Disclosure: ProprietaryTrading.com is also a prop firm comparison site and earns affiliate commissions from some of the firms named here, including Blue Guardian. See our Affiliate Disclosure.