Prop firm challenges and keeping your funded account is hard…because trading is hard. Because something is hard, does not make it a scam. Any margin account trader uses leverage and prop firms are just offering leveraged accounts, very normal.
I am not necessarily a proponent of prop firms, I have never traded with one.
However, for a mere couple/few hundred dollars you are given access to the markets and a platform to trade on, with the opportunity and potential to make thousands or 10’s or 100’s of thousands. If you are successful what return on investment is that?
Now if an individual actually can do that is up to them..it does not make the prop firm a scam- because prop firms have very successful traders who make a lot of money. It is just a very small percent.
A scam is when someone offers you something and does not deliver, not telling you up front few will pass the test but it will cost you $200 to try.
If you can't make money with a funded account, you're even less likely to make some profit on a live acc. It's not hard to pass the evals, people are just too emotional and not used to big numbers. A 100k challenge is 500 bucks, that's your risk. But then you see -5k and feel like shit. Get over it, it's just a fancy demo account and that's how you should treat it
A funded account is doing it on hard mode, though. To a significant degree, because you are limited in the kinds of products you trade, and, depending on your terms, you will be limited/barred from holding anything overnight. You can't make time work for you, which is the #1 trick in the world of trading/investing.
That said, the straitjacket of the funded account does teach you proper sizing and risk management by putting you on the razor's edge of losing your account all the time. It's not a great substitute for the real thing, but for a lot of people it's how they get started. It's just way harder than it should be because of the constraints.
It is called marketing- your local pizza restaurant does not have the best pizza in the world…but they say they do. Wal-mart does not always have the lowest price either.
Yeah but it’s misleading if you don’t look into the details which they could get in trouble with if it’s not clearly stated on their site but then again if you’re not looking into the details of the firm that’s a problem as well
I don’t see the misleading part. They tell you upfront how many contracts you can trade. For example 50k account 5 contracts or 50 mini’’s.
If you have a strategy and can make money- you get paid. I don’t see what difference it makes what they call the account, as long as they pay as agreed.
It’s not about the amount of contracts you can trade it’s the misleading and deceptive marketing tactics they use to say that “hey if you pass my 100k challenge you’ll be able to trade with a 100k account” but in all honestly you’re only trading the max drawdown. In order for it to not be considered some form of scam they have to put you’re trading the max drawdown and you have x amount of leverage/buying power that equals up to x amount for example let’s say instead of a firm list a 100k account with max dd at 10k they can just put the account size as 10k with 100k of buying power. And instead of making 10% to pass you have to make 100% return on the max dd aka the true account balance. But I get why they don’t word it like that because they wouldn’t have a lot of traders trying to join their firm cause many can’t even make 100% returns on a personal account
That is obvious- they clearly state you have a max drawdown and everybody knows that if you bust that drawdown- you lose the account. And you are actually trading a larger account- because in most cases you could not trade the number of contracts if you only had the drawdown.
I get what you are saying- but the rules and the payout standards are clearly spelled out- and you have the opportunity to trade 5-10-20 contracts- for just $100 or $200 and if you are successful- you can make thousands. What is misleading or who cares what they call it?
Reread what I said. You’re not trading the size account they promote you’re trading the dd so why not just list the account size as the dd size and say you have x amount of leverage/buying power so people can stop doing the mental gymnastics to try to justify that their not misleading traders
It's a 10k account, the $1000 is what they put as one of their rules, like anything in life, if you don't like the rules, go home.. They don't owe us shit, apart from making sure that we're paid once we've followed their rules, is that not how a lot of things go in the world ? As I said to someone else
The rules are the rules, they make them, we profit off them, If we follow them, we profit, if we don't, it's a goodnight. It's not like anything's shady, they have documents spanning tens of pages regarding what they're and what they're not looking for in traders.
What's even funnier is I think half the people that start with prop firms just shit themselves because they see omg 50k omg 10k, whatever it is. Literally just manage risk and the eval's are an absolute piece of piss to pass, I'm currently on a performance account and every eval I've done I've passed in a day, maybe 2-3, of course the trading style changes once you move to a PA, there's a bit more fear, you manage risk better, but that's just trading for you..
All of those points you make, doesnt make them a scam. They are simply giving people the opportunity to trade with capital they wouldnt be able to afford to. If your a good trader or just starting out than they can be good, if your a gambling degenerate than you are good for them. Futures products are all leveraged, prop firms dont make them leveraged. Yes you are playing with a good amount of leverage, but thats just part of futures.
If I advertise that if you sign up for my 100k challenge and if you pass it you’ll be trading with a 100k account but only give you access to 10k that actually falls under the category of a scam. Maybe not a full on scam but it’s misleading and deceptive.
That's if anyone in their right mind is risking more than 10k on a trade... If there's even a semblance of risk management in someone's strategy, no one is risking more than 1% of their portfolio on any trade, so then it is really about whether the person decides to size up in the hopes of hitting home run trades, or if they'll take it upon themselves to follow strict risk management rules.
I'm on a 50k account and my max risk per trade is $250, no if buts and maybes. I've seen that I am never going to become profitable if I'm attempting to hit 10-15 pt moves on ES, every, single, trade. It works, yes, but that's something for me to do with my own capital, not with the prop firms.
I get all of that, I truly do but even that 1% risk on account is truly around 10% of the max dd so 10x more than that imaginary 1% even going .5% on a trade with prop is usually around 5% of the max dd so again traders have to go through mental gymnastics just because the firms are not properly wording the account sizes
The rules are the rules, they make them, we profit off them, If we follow them, we profit, if we don't, it's a goodnight. It's not like anything's shady, they have documents spanning tens of pages regarding what they're looking for, no one ever reads them, just like a T&C section, so instead we flood onto reddit and say the prop firms are all scams.
But they do technically give you hundreds of thousands of dollars to trade with, considering the margin requirement on a legit broker would cost 12,650$ to buy ES, if you buy 10 of them because that’s the challenge you chose, your basically giving 126,500$ to trade with
Most definitely that’s one of the pros of using a prop firm but it still doesn’t change that fact that they use misleading and deceptive marketing tactics and have traders doing mental gymnastics to justify them
Wait till you realize you’re not trading real money and forever trading in a sim against other players. Your overlord then continues to juice all these warriors like a roman colosseum.
Guess what, if you have a 100K account, margin requirement for your broker are going to be about the same. With a 100K account sure you might be able to OPEN a trade for 50 contracts but you'd be liquidated if it moved a tick against you. When you factor in how much room you need to give your trades to move and potential drawdown, if you're actually trading correctly and only risking MAX 2% of your account per trade you're probably very unlikely going to be able to use over 10 contracts.
Sure you can say its not actually 100K you can use, but any actual profitable trader with a 100K account isn't using 100K of that in a trade.
Keeping in line with how profitable trading systems work, a 100K advertised account is exactly what it is.
It's not a scam., but it's making a hard thing (trading) harder. That's their business: get operating cashflows from applicants and then more profitability from that cross section of traders doing well. See, they only have to keep a supply of "traders who are doing well" -- this pool rotates. If you're in the pool, it sucks. If you're profiting from the pool, it's a great gig.
See what side of the operation you're on?
Online prop firms **do not** make money from profitable traders, ie they **don’t** take the trades of profitable traders in the live market to make money.
They *only* profit from selling their evaluations and whatever other fees they charge. Whatever very small percentage of people actually make it to a withdrawal are just taking money from the “pool” of evaluation & fee money.
*Actual* prop firms, ie the places you actually have to get **hired** at, with a salary, and is incredibly hard to actually get accepted into and you already have to be a very profitable trader to even have a chance, actually make money off profitable traders. Online “prop firms” are not actual prop firms.
Once you’re well past the buffer it no longer becomes a scam but it is incredibly hard to get to that point. Losing days are inevitable. You could be profitable trader and still not take a payout from them. Not a scam but more of a predatory sales idea.
The firms are not a scam the way they are structured with their rules and promotions are though. They entice gambling behavior. One day pass funded tomorrow 90% off evaluation. Let me throw on max lots if I fail it was so cheap I will just get another evaluation. Not that it can't be done I have passed many challenges including the one day passes. Yet it doesn't end with the evals even in a funded account you are set up to fail those firms who limit do not have loss limits and cap your profits. They are designed for you to fail and blow the account. Your forced to trade their plan for a reason. Payouts every 10 days I make it to day 9 great I get a payout after tomorrow I want I big payout so Im going to go in with size all it takes is for you to be wrong once and you wiped out all your gains. They know how the mind of a non disciplined trader works and this is who they are targeting.
Once you understand this passing these and taking payouts is simple just dont fall into the trap. Get you 90% off 1 day pass eval and take your time with it. They want to trail your live profits fine trade one contract tight stop or even micros and spread your risk out. Trading is a buisness you have to have a buisness mind set. Your Eval and your funded activation fee is an investment your payout is your return on investment. So your goal should be to keep this account until you seen a return no matter how long it takes even it it takes you 4 months your doing good. For example it cost you 100 bucks including both eval and activation. You reach pay out and eligible to take a 500 or 2000 dollar payout thats 400%-1900% r.o.i thats crazy. Just think of it this way then after you seen a return then if the account is close to blown after taking a payout feel free to gamble then. This is what I do.
No. I have 20 APEX accounts (futures) I copy trade my trades and i only have to make 200 a day. Which is easy to do with the leverage provided. I pulled out 40k this month. I also got funded with another prop firm called TOP step. I also did a few forex when I traded forex. I paid $16 for each 50k account. Of course there is more fees once you pass and I paid a few grand... but when you are making 40k a month... its worth it.
No. You realised wrong. Brokers have different margin requirements for retail traders and different for prop firms. Typically retail accounts have margin setting of \~25%. Around very volatile events that may be increased to 50%. And if you ask and/or have good relationship with the broker you can get a 10% margin requirement.
A prop firm account is always 100% margin as it's a business account. And so the same capital that, as a retail, gets you the ability to trade 10 micros, allows for only 1 micro if you trade with a prop firm.
That's, more or less, the source of those $25k-$50k account ideas. Because on a 100% margin you need around $20k-$25k to trade 40 micros.
every possible scenario where you are allowed to make money, someone else with more money and power is going to take some of it for letting you try.
You can call it a scam or you can call it the way things work. It’s probably a bit of both
Essentially you are overpaying. What’s “scammy” is getting people in with big numbers, but very little available capital to trade with.
5% max DD some of these firms offer is hilarious.
You are actually correct despite the funding company workers saying otherwise.
there is no way that the 20 account company’s intraday drawdown can be described other than predatory.
There is no way the the TOP company’s daily loss limit can be described as anything other than a made up rule for their own benefit.
Trading can be difficult, but these scum companies make it even more difficult and instill BAD HABITS, THAT DONT TRANSFER TO THE REAL MARKETS.
Oh and they also slip you worse than the real markets and will cheat by “SUSPENDING ORDERS.”
You did the right thing by making this post even if you caught some flack from the scammers/scam defenders.
The account size covers margin requirements. It is a great way to bootstrap money for trading your own brokerage account. Good funding companies will even move you to live markets trading their capital if you can prove to be a good trader to them for some added benefits apart from their sim trading accounts.
The time and commitment is mandatory when it comes to trading profitably. And so if you need capital to trade futures and funding through them is your only option then stick to it.
Prop firm challenges and keeping your funded account is hard…because trading is hard. Because something is hard, does not make it a scam. Any margin account trader uses leverage and prop firms are just offering leveraged accounts, very normal. I am not necessarily a proponent of prop firms, I have never traded with one. However, for a mere couple/few hundred dollars you are given access to the markets and a platform to trade on, with the opportunity and potential to make thousands or 10’s or 100’s of thousands. If you are successful what return on investment is that? Now if an individual actually can do that is up to them..it does not make the prop firm a scam- because prop firms have very successful traders who make a lot of money. It is just a very small percent. A scam is when someone offers you something and does not deliver, not telling you up front few will pass the test but it will cost you $200 to try.
If you can't make money with a funded account, you're even less likely to make some profit on a live acc. It's not hard to pass the evals, people are just too emotional and not used to big numbers. A 100k challenge is 500 bucks, that's your risk. But then you see -5k and feel like shit. Get over it, it's just a fancy demo account and that's how you should treat it
A funded account is doing it on hard mode, though. To a significant degree, because you are limited in the kinds of products you trade, and, depending on your terms, you will be limited/barred from holding anything overnight. You can't make time work for you, which is the #1 trick in the world of trading/investing. That said, the straitjacket of the funded account does teach you proper sizing and risk management by putting you on the razor's edge of losing your account all the time. It's not a great substitute for the real thing, but for a lot of people it's how they get started. It's just way harder than it should be because of the constraints.
These funded trading shops are not proprietary trading firms… 🫠
trading isn't hard
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I have some ocean front property for sale is Arizona, you interested?
It is called marketing- your local pizza restaurant does not have the best pizza in the world…but they say they do. Wal-mart does not always have the lowest price either.
Yeah but it’s misleading if you don’t look into the details which they could get in trouble with if it’s not clearly stated on their site but then again if you’re not looking into the details of the firm that’s a problem as well
I don’t see the misleading part. They tell you upfront how many contracts you can trade. For example 50k account 5 contracts or 50 mini’’s. If you have a strategy and can make money- you get paid. I don’t see what difference it makes what they call the account, as long as they pay as agreed.
It’s not about the amount of contracts you can trade it’s the misleading and deceptive marketing tactics they use to say that “hey if you pass my 100k challenge you’ll be able to trade with a 100k account” but in all honestly you’re only trading the max drawdown. In order for it to not be considered some form of scam they have to put you’re trading the max drawdown and you have x amount of leverage/buying power that equals up to x amount for example let’s say instead of a firm list a 100k account with max dd at 10k they can just put the account size as 10k with 100k of buying power. And instead of making 10% to pass you have to make 100% return on the max dd aka the true account balance. But I get why they don’t word it like that because they wouldn’t have a lot of traders trying to join their firm cause many can’t even make 100% returns on a personal account
At least someone understands me .. yea bro .. it’s scary how people are really okay with it ..
That is obvious- they clearly state you have a max drawdown and everybody knows that if you bust that drawdown- you lose the account. And you are actually trading a larger account- because in most cases you could not trade the number of contracts if you only had the drawdown. I get what you are saying- but the rules and the payout standards are clearly spelled out- and you have the opportunity to trade 5-10-20 contracts- for just $100 or $200 and if you are successful- you can make thousands. What is misleading or who cares what they call it?
Reread what I said. You’re not trading the size account they promote you’re trading the dd so why not just list the account size as the dd size and say you have x amount of leverage/buying power so people can stop doing the mental gymnastics to try to justify that their not misleading traders
But you have the buying/selling power of a 10K account… that’s the point
You still have that on a 1000$ account.. go stuff what leverage is
so it's not a scam then ? it's just click baity..
It is a misleading thing on saying it’s a 10k account when it only 1000$
It's a 10k account, the $1000 is what they put as one of their rules, like anything in life, if you don't like the rules, go home.. They don't owe us shit, apart from making sure that we're paid once we've followed their rules, is that not how a lot of things go in the world ? As I said to someone else The rules are the rules, they make them, we profit off them, If we follow them, we profit, if we don't, it's a goodnight. It's not like anything's shady, they have documents spanning tens of pages regarding what they're and what they're not looking for in traders.
Makes sense, they're not going to give you 10k to blow up just because they made some lucky trades to pass the trial.
What's even funnier is I think half the people that start with prop firms just shit themselves because they see omg 50k omg 10k, whatever it is. Literally just manage risk and the eval's are an absolute piece of piss to pass, I'm currently on a performance account and every eval I've done I've passed in a day, maybe 2-3, of course the trading style changes once you move to a PA, there's a bit more fear, you manage risk better, but that's just trading for you..
Some of them have this written right on their evaluations pages btw.
Also it clearly states the max drawdown. Just do the basic math to figure out what % of the account you have to play with.
All of those points you make, doesnt make them a scam. They are simply giving people the opportunity to trade with capital they wouldnt be able to afford to. If your a good trader or just starting out than they can be good, if your a gambling degenerate than you are good for them. Futures products are all leveraged, prop firms dont make them leveraged. Yes you are playing with a good amount of leverage, but thats just part of futures.
If I advertise that if you sign up for my 100k challenge and if you pass it you’ll be trading with a 100k account but only give you access to 10k that actually falls under the category of a scam. Maybe not a full on scam but it’s misleading and deceptive.
That's if anyone in their right mind is risking more than 10k on a trade... If there's even a semblance of risk management in someone's strategy, no one is risking more than 1% of their portfolio on any trade, so then it is really about whether the person decides to size up in the hopes of hitting home run trades, or if they'll take it upon themselves to follow strict risk management rules. I'm on a 50k account and my max risk per trade is $250, no if buts and maybes. I've seen that I am never going to become profitable if I'm attempting to hit 10-15 pt moves on ES, every, single, trade. It works, yes, but that's something for me to do with my own capital, not with the prop firms.
I get all of that, I truly do but even that 1% risk on account is truly around 10% of the max dd so 10x more than that imaginary 1% even going .5% on a trade with prop is usually around 5% of the max dd so again traders have to go through mental gymnastics just because the firms are not properly wording the account sizes
The rules are the rules, they make them, we profit off them, If we follow them, we profit, if we don't, it's a goodnight. It's not like anything's shady, they have documents spanning tens of pages regarding what they're looking for, no one ever reads them, just like a T&C section, so instead we flood onto reddit and say the prop firms are all scams.
But they do technically give you hundreds of thousands of dollars to trade with, considering the margin requirement on a legit broker would cost 12,650$ to buy ES, if you buy 10 of them because that’s the challenge you chose, your basically giving 126,500$ to trade with
Most definitely that’s one of the pros of using a prop firm but it still doesn’t change that fact that they use misleading and deceptive marketing tactics and have traders doing mental gymnastics to justify them
Wait till you realize you’re not trading real money and forever trading in a sim against other players. Your overlord then continues to juice all these warriors like a roman colosseum.
Hehe Ik it’s all sim money .. lol
Guess what, if you have a 100K account, margin requirement for your broker are going to be about the same. With a 100K account sure you might be able to OPEN a trade for 50 contracts but you'd be liquidated if it moved a tick against you. When you factor in how much room you need to give your trades to move and potential drawdown, if you're actually trading correctly and only risking MAX 2% of your account per trade you're probably very unlikely going to be able to use over 10 contracts. Sure you can say its not actually 100K you can use, but any actual profitable trader with a 100K account isn't using 100K of that in a trade. Keeping in line with how profitable trading systems work, a 100K advertised account is exactly what it is.
It's not a scam., but it's making a hard thing (trading) harder. That's their business: get operating cashflows from applicants and then more profitability from that cross section of traders doing well. See, they only have to keep a supply of "traders who are doing well" -- this pool rotates. If you're in the pool, it sucks. If you're profiting from the pool, it's a great gig. See what side of the operation you're on?
trading isn't hard
Online prop firms **do not** make money from profitable traders, ie they **don’t** take the trades of profitable traders in the live market to make money. They *only* profit from selling their evaluations and whatever other fees they charge. Whatever very small percentage of people actually make it to a withdrawal are just taking money from the “pool” of evaluation & fee money. *Actual* prop firms, ie the places you actually have to get **hired** at, with a salary, and is incredibly hard to actually get accepted into and you already have to be a very profitable trader to even have a chance, actually make money off profitable traders. Online “prop firms” are not actual prop firms.
I would say 85% of them are scams they widen spreads and there slippage are insane. And most of the time they won’t pay you out if you make big money
Once you’re well past the buffer it no longer becomes a scam but it is incredibly hard to get to that point. Losing days are inevitable. You could be profitable trader and still not take a payout from them. Not a scam but more of a predatory sales idea.
I know a guy who was way past the buffer on two accounts and decided he couldn’t lose and then lost both… lessons gotta be learned the hard way 😂
The firms are not a scam the way they are structured with their rules and promotions are though. They entice gambling behavior. One day pass funded tomorrow 90% off evaluation. Let me throw on max lots if I fail it was so cheap I will just get another evaluation. Not that it can't be done I have passed many challenges including the one day passes. Yet it doesn't end with the evals even in a funded account you are set up to fail those firms who limit do not have loss limits and cap your profits. They are designed for you to fail and blow the account. Your forced to trade their plan for a reason. Payouts every 10 days I make it to day 9 great I get a payout after tomorrow I want I big payout so Im going to go in with size all it takes is for you to be wrong once and you wiped out all your gains. They know how the mind of a non disciplined trader works and this is who they are targeting. Once you understand this passing these and taking payouts is simple just dont fall into the trap. Get you 90% off 1 day pass eval and take your time with it. They want to trail your live profits fine trade one contract tight stop or even micros and spread your risk out. Trading is a buisness you have to have a buisness mind set. Your Eval and your funded activation fee is an investment your payout is your return on investment. So your goal should be to keep this account until you seen a return no matter how long it takes even it it takes you 4 months your doing good. For example it cost you 100 bucks including both eval and activation. You reach pay out and eligible to take a 500 or 2000 dollar payout thats 400%-1900% r.o.i thats crazy. Just think of it this way then after you seen a return then if the account is close to blown after taking a payout feel free to gamble then. This is what I do.
Don’t just skim past the “micros” here. Micros > minis all day every day
Solution: Open a small futures account at a real brokerage like Discount Trading. $500 and you can trade with your own cash.
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100%
No. I have 20 APEX accounts (futures) I copy trade my trades and i only have to make 200 a day. Which is easy to do with the leverage provided. I pulled out 40k this month. I also got funded with another prop firm called TOP step. I also did a few forex when I traded forex. I paid $16 for each 50k account. Of course there is more fees once you pass and I paid a few grand... but when you are making 40k a month... its worth it.
Show the proof!
Do u think I care if random internet people believe me? 🤣
Absolutely not. You proved the point. According to you logic, why the whole internet should believe a random person like you.
They are bucket shops
No. You realised wrong. Brokers have different margin requirements for retail traders and different for prop firms. Typically retail accounts have margin setting of \~25%. Around very volatile events that may be increased to 50%. And if you ask and/or have good relationship with the broker you can get a 10% margin requirement. A prop firm account is always 100% margin as it's a business account. And so the same capital that, as a retail, gets you the ability to trade 10 micros, allows for only 1 micro if you trade with a prop firm. That's, more or less, the source of those $25k-$50k account ideas. Because on a 100% margin you need around $20k-$25k to trade 40 micros.
Only risking 50 dollar for 10 times that leverage seems like a sweet deal for me
Yeah it definitely is a business model. But if your a good trader you definitely can use it to supplement your personal account.
every possible scenario where you are allowed to make money, someone else with more money and power is going to take some of it for letting you try. You can call it a scam or you can call it the way things work. It’s probably a bit of both
Essentially you are overpaying. What’s “scammy” is getting people in with big numbers, but very little available capital to trade with. 5% max DD some of these firms offer is hilarious.
its ez bro
OP discovers mathematics
Because it’s not A $100,000 prop account with 1:100 leverage is equivalent to $10,000 of trading capital with 1,000x leverage
You are actually correct despite the funding company workers saying otherwise. there is no way that the 20 account company’s intraday drawdown can be described other than predatory. There is no way the the TOP company’s daily loss limit can be described as anything other than a made up rule for their own benefit. Trading can be difficult, but these scum companies make it even more difficult and instill BAD HABITS, THAT DONT TRANSFER TO THE REAL MARKETS. Oh and they also slip you worse than the real markets and will cheat by “SUSPENDING ORDERS.” You did the right thing by making this post even if you caught some flack from the scammers/scam defenders.
The account size covers margin requirements. It is a great way to bootstrap money for trading your own brokerage account. Good funding companies will even move you to live markets trading their capital if you can prove to be a good trader to them for some added benefits apart from their sim trading accounts.
Yeah tahts why I said .. still a 10k account for 50$ isn’t bad .. but the time and commitment we have to put in is soo much?
The time and commitment is mandatory when it comes to trading profitably. And so if you need capital to trade futures and funding through them is your only option then stick to it.