Chicago-based NinjaTrader Group announced the launch of NinjaTrader Connect on Tuesday, a business-to-business (B2B) infrastructure platform designed to let fintechs and brokerages offer regulated futures and prediction markets through a single API.
The platform packages onboarding, funding, margining, surveillance, pre-trade checks, and clearing into one integration. It also includes a white-label trading platform that partners can brand as their own.
In simple terms, NinjaTrader is trying to turn the traditional Futures Commission Merchant (FCM) clearing relationship into a plug-in brokerage backend.
“We’ve spent more than 20 years building, operating, and scaling a retail futures brokerage in highly regulated markets,” said Martin Franchi, CEO of NinjaTrader Group. “NinjaTrader Connect takes the infrastructure behind that success and makes it available to other brokerages.”
Max Shanbrom, Executive Vice President and General Manager at NinjaTrader Connect, said the role of the FCM is changing.
“Market access alone is no longer enough. Modern brokerages need infrastructure that supports onboarding, funding, risk management, and a seamless trading experience,” Shanbrom said.
Why prediction markets matter here
The inclusion of event contracts, the legal term for prediction markets in the US, is a product extension. These contracts became a viable regulated product after the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) dropped its appeal in the KalshiEX case in May 2025, effectively ending a legal challenge that had argued political event contracts constituted “gaming.”
But distribution comes with compliance overhead. On February 25, the CFTC’s enforcement division issued an advisory warning about insider trading and manipulation in prediction markets, citing cases on the Kalshi exchange involving a political candidate trading on his own race and a YouTube editor trading on advance knowledge of video releases.
That enforcement posture makes the surveillance and pre-trade controls bundled into NinjaTrader Connect operationally relevant for any partner looking to distribute event contracts.
Interactive Brokers already launched its own CFTC-regulated prediction market subsidiary, ForecastEx LLC, in 2024.
Kraken backdrop
The launch follows crypto exchange Kraken’s agreement to acquire NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion, announced in March 2025. NinjaTrader continues to operate as a standalone platform under the Kraken umbrella, with the deal positioned as a step toward multi-asset regulated trading across futures, crypto derivatives, and event contracts.
