How to Build a Prop Firm That Survives: Moneta Funded CEO David Bily on Risk, Payouts, and Infrastructure

The proprietary trading industry has been through a difficult period. A wave of firm closures and payout disputes in 2024 left many traders questioning who they can trust with their capital and their performance. The firms that endure are no longer the ones with the loudest marketing. They are the ones built on real infrastructure, disciplined risk management, and a payout process traders can rely on.

Against that backdrop, Axcera spoke with David Bily, Chief Executive Officer of Moneta Funded, the proprietary trading arm of regulated broker Moneta Markets. The conversation moves from the firm's founding logic to the operational decisions that determine whether a prop firm survives at scale. David is direct about profit splits, scaling tiers, risk discipline, and the systems required to process tens of thousands of challenge accounts. He also explains why Moneta Funded built its operational backbone with Axcera rather than in-house. The full interview follows.

Brand and origin

Q1. Moneta Markets has been a regulated broker since 2019. What was the trigger to launch a prop firm?

David Bily: For years, Moneta Markets has focused on building the trading infrastructure, liquidity relationships, technology, risk systems, and operational discipline required to serve traders globally. As the prop trading sector grew, we saw strong demand from talented traders who had skill and discipline, but not always the capital to trade at a meaningful scale.

At the same time, we also saw many prop firms enter the market without the infrastructure, financial discipline, or long-term mindset required to support traders properly. For us, the trigger was simple. If we were going to enter the space, we wanted to do it properly. Moneta Funded is the natural evolution of Moneta Markets, using our brokerage experience to create a more credible, sustainable, and trader-focused prop model.

Q2. Most prop firms operate as standalone ventures. You chose to make Moneta Funded explicitly broker-backed. What does that mean in practice for a trader who signs up today?

David Bily: Broker-backed means the trader is not signing up with a prop firm built purely on marketing, outsourced platforms, and a thin operational layer. They are signing up with a firm supported by real brokerage infrastructure, real market experience, and a team that understands execution, risk, compliance, client operations, and trader behaviour.

Q3. The prop trading space has been plagued by firm collapses and payout disputes. How did those industry failures shape the model you built at Moneta Funded?

David Bily: They shaped it significantly. The failures in the prop industry have shown that aggressive marketing alone is not a business model. Offering unrealistic terms, underinvesting in risk systems, delaying payouts, or relying too heavily on short-term challenge revenue creates instability.

When we built Moneta Funded, we focused on sustainability first. That means clear rules, robust risk controls, scalable technology, responsible challenge design, and a payout process that traders can trust. We are not interested in building a firm that grows quickly and breaks under pressure. We are building one that can still be here in three, five, and ten years.

The traders who succeed in this space are disciplined and consistent. The firms that survive need to be the same.

Trader experience: product and challenge design

Q4. The Phoenix programme allows scaling to two million dollars. What percentage of traders realistically reach that level, and what does the data show about the profile of traders who succeed?

David Bily: The honest answer is that only a small percentage of traders will reach the highest scaling tiers. That is not a weakness of the model. It is the reality of trading. Scaling to two million dollars is designed for traders who demonstrate consistency, discipline, and proper risk management over time.

What we see from successful traders is not usually one huge trade or an extremely aggressive approach. The strongest profiles tend to be traders who protect capital first, keep position sizing under control, avoid emotional trading, and understand that longevity matters more than a single big result.

The Phoenix programme is not designed to reward luck. It is designed to identify traders who can perform sustainably. Those are the traders we want to support and scale.

Q5. You offer 88 percent in regular challenges and a 100 percent profit split in the sprint challenge. Some competitors are at 90 percent. What is the trade-off you are making, and why do you believe your structure is more sustainable long-term?

David Bily: The trade-off is sustainability over headline marketing. It is easy to advertise a slightly higher split. The more important question is whether the firm can support that structure long-term, continue paying traders on time, invest in technology, manage risk responsibly, and keep the product commercially viable.

Our regular challenges offer an 88 percent profit split, which is still highly competitive, while allowing us to maintain the infrastructure, support, and payout systems traders expect. With Sprint, we offer a 100 percent profit split because the product structure allows for it.

We are not trying to win a marketing arms race on one isolated number. We are trying to build a model where traders can trust the rules, trust the payout process, and trust that the firm will still be operating when they are ready to scale.

Infrastructure: technology and operations

Q6. You reference Equinix fibre-optic connections and tier-1 liquidity in your positioning. Walk us through what institutional-grade infrastructure actually means for a retail trader doing a $ 5,000 challenge.

David Bily: For a trader, institutional-grade infrastructure should not just sound impressive. It should be felt in the trading experience.

It means the environment behind the platform has been built for speed, stability, and consistency. Equinix data centres, fibre-optic connectivity, low-latency execution infrastructure, and tier-1 liquidity relationships all contribute to a stronger trading setup. Even for a trader taking a $5,000 challenge, that matters.

It means the platform is less likely to become the reason a trader fails. It means pricing, execution, connectivity, and account operations are supported by systems designed for scale. Traders still need to perform, manage risk, and follow the rules, but they should be doing that on infrastructure that gives them a fair and stable environment.

Q7. As a rapidly scaling firm processing tens of thousands of challenge accounts, what are the biggest operational bottlenecks you face, and how are you solving them?

David Bily: At scale, the biggest bottlenecks are rarely just about marketing or demand. They are operational. Account creation, KYC, trader lifecycle management, payout workflows, risk reviews, support queries, and internal reporting all need to move quickly and accurately.

If those systems are not connected properly, the trader experience suffers. Delays create frustration, manual work creates errors, and weak reporting makes it harder to manage growth responsibly.

That is why we have invested heavily in the operational backbone of Moneta Funded. Partnerships with specialist infrastructure providers like Axcera allow us to automate more of the trader lifecycle, reduce friction in the back office, and give our internal teams better visibility across accounts, statuses, payouts, and risk events. Fast growth is only a good thing if the infrastructure can keep up with it.

Q8. Risk management is existential for a prop firm. How does your risk infrastructure differ from a typical prop firm that is just running a white-label solution?

David Bily: A typical white-label prop setup can get a firm to market quickly, but speed to market is not the same as long-term resilience.

Our approach is different because Moneta Funded is built with the risk discipline of a brokerage business. We are not just looking at whether a trader passes or fails a rule. We are looking at how trading behaviour, exposure, platform activity, and operational flows interact across the business.

Risk management is not one dashboard or one rule engine. It is the combination of technology, monitoring, internal controls, data, people, and decision-making. Moneta Markets has years of experience managing trading infrastructure and market risk. That experience gives Moneta Funded a stronger foundation than a firm that simply plugs into an off-the-shelf solution and hopes the model holds. In prop trading, risk is not a department. It is the business.

The Axcera partnership

Q9. Before partnering with Axcera, what were the key operational pain points in your back office and trader lifecycle management, and what did those inefficiencies cost you?

David Bily: Before partnering with Axcera, the challenge was not demand. The challenge was operational scale. As volumes increased, we needed more automation and better visibility across the entire trader lifecycle. Account creation, KYC status, challenge progress, account upgrades, payout preparation, and internal reporting all needed to be faster and more connected.

The cost of inefficiency in this industry is not only internal time. It affects trader confidence. If a trader has to wait too long for an account, a status update, or a payout review, it damages trust. In prop trading, speed and clarity are part of the product.

Axcera helped us move from a more fragmented operational flow to a stronger, more scalable infrastructure layer.

Q10. Axcera supports a high volume of trading account creations every month across its network. Since onboarding Axcera, what specific improvements have you seen in your account creation speed, KYC automation, and operational throughput?

David Bily: Axcera has helped us improve the speed and consistency of our back-office operations, particularly around account creation, lifecycle management, and workflow automation.

The biggest improvement has been reducing manual friction. Account creation is faster, KYC processes are easier to track, and our team has better visibility over where each trader sits in the journey. That means fewer delays, fewer manual touchpoints, and a smoother experience for traders.

For a scaling prop firm, that operational throughput is critical. Traders expect near-instant access, clear communication, and fast resolution. Axcera has helped us support that standard while giving our internal teams the structure needed to manage higher volumes.

Q11. Payout processing is one of the most reputation-sensitive operations in prop trading. How has Axcera's infrastructure improved your payout cycle, and what has that meant for trader trust and retention?

David Bily: Payouts are where trust is either reinforced or lost. A trader can accept strict rules if they are clear. They can accept a difficult challenge if the environment is fair. What they will not accept is uncertainty around being paid. That is why payout infrastructure is so important.

Axcera has helped us improve the operational flow around payout cycles by making the process more structured, trackable, and scalable. It gives our teams better visibility, reduces manual bottlenecks, and helps ensure approved payouts move through the process more efficiently.

For traders, that means greater confidence. When payouts are handled professionally and consistently, retention improves because traders feel they are dealing with a firm that respects their performance. In this industry, timely payouts are not just an operational function. They are a brand promise.

Q12. For prop firm founders who are considering their infrastructure stack, what would you tell them about the cost of underinvesting in back-end technology, and why did you choose Axcera over building in-house?

David Bily: The cost of underinvesting in back-end technology always shows up eventually. At first, it looks like saved money. Later, it becomes delays, manual errors, poor visibility, frustrated traders, support pressure, and reputational damage.

In prop trading, the front end gets the attention: the offer, the challenge, the payout split, the marketing. But the back end decides whether the business can actually scale.

We chose Axcera because we wanted a specialist infrastructure partner that already understood the trading account lifecycle at scale. Building everything in-house can sound attractive, but it is expensive, time-consuming, and risky if you are trying to scale quickly. Axcera allowed us to strengthen our operational foundation while keeping our internal teams focused on product, trader experience, risk, and growth.

If I were advising another founder, I would say this. Do not wait until your operations are under stress before investing in infrastructure. By then, the damage may already be visible to your traders.

“Underinvesting in back-end technology does not save money. It simply delays the cost until it becomes operational, reputational, and much harder to fix.”

Industry vision: market outlook and leadership

Q13. The prop firm industry saw a wave of closures in 2024. What do you believe separates the firms that will still be operating in 2027 from those that will not?

David Bily: The firms that survive will be the ones that understand prop trading is not just a marketing business. It is a risk, technology, operations, and trust business.

By 2027, I think the market will look very different. Firms with weak infrastructure, unclear rules, unsustainable promotions, poor payout practices, or limited compliance capability will find it harder to survive. Traders are becoming more sophisticated. They are asking better questions. They want to know who is behind the firm, how it is funded, how payouts work, and whether the model is built to last.

The firms that remain will be those with strong infrastructure, disciplined risk management, credible leadership, transparent rules, and a genuine commitment to traders. That is the direction the industry needs to move in, and that is where Moneta Funded is focused.

Q14. Regulation of prop trading is increasing globally. As a broker-backed firm, how are you preparing for tighter compliance requirements, and do you see that as a threat or an advantage?

David Bily: We see higher standards as an advantage. Moneta Funded benefits from being connected to a brokerage group that already understands regulated environments, compliance expectations, client communication standards, financial promotions, onboarding controls, and operational governance. That does not mean prop trading and brokerage are the same. They are not. But the discipline required to operate responsibly is very similar.

As the industry matures, firms will need to be more transparent, more careful with marketing claims, more consistent with rules, and more robust in how they manage trader relationships. We welcome that direction because it rewards firms that are already investing in sustainability.

Regulation tends to expose weak models. For firms built properly, it can become a competitive moat.

Q15. Where do you see Moneta Funded in three years, in terms of funded trader count, capital deployed, and geographic reach?

David Bily: In three years, we want Moneta Funded to be recognised as one of the most trusted broker-backed prop firms globally. We are ambitious, but we are not chasing vanity growth. Funded trader count, capital allocation, and geographic expansion all matter, but only if they are supported by the right infrastructure, risk systems, and trader experience.

Our goal is to scale responsibly across key global markets, expand the number of serious traders we support, and continue improving the technology and operational standards behind the business. We want Moneta Funded to be known not only for challenge terms, but for trust, execution quality, payouts, and longevity.

The next phase of the industry will reward firms that can combine strong trader demand with institutional-grade operations. That is where we believe Moneta Funded is positioned.

Closing thoughts

David Bily's perspective reflects a clear thesis. In proprietary trading, the firms that last treat risk, technology, and operations as the core of the business, not an afterthought. As regulation tightens and traders ask harder questions, that discipline becomes a competitive advantage. Moneta Funded is positioning itself for that next phase, supported by the infrastructure layer Axcera provides.

Axcera provides the operational infrastructure behind scaling prop firms, covering account creation, KYC, trader lifecycle management, payouts, and risk operations. To see how that works in practice, book a demo here.

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