Biggest issue is thinking you have $200k to trade with. You don't. You have $20k. End of the day it is well known that prop firms like these make money on failed challenges rather than from profitable traders.
FTMO, which was mentioned here earlier. But many other prop firms offering the "challenge" program use comparable 5%/10% daily/total limits, e.g. MFF, TCF, EnFoid, TFT...
I wish I had found this thread earlier. I have been funded by one of the popular trading firms. I am on my second fund. The funder, who I will not name yet, certainly did not expect me to become this consistent. I have received money from them, but I have noticed that after the first payment, they make it difficult to receive. It is DEFINITELY not within their business plan to do business with consistent day traders. Day trading is a science. Once you figure out the science, you can trade anything, in any market on earth, as long as there is institutional liquidity, and a central banking system. That is the business. So the best traders in the world have accounts large enough to move markets. When commodities are trading in the asian session with 100-200 volume per 5m candle, it is not hard to move those prices with a prime brokerage account. However, some amazing traders are also present in the retail world. Some of these traders have learned trading out of necessity, due to inflation, unemployment, and high cost of living and eating expenses, has forced many people to really buckle down and learn the business of day trading. Many of these people are still living hand to mouth, in attempts to build their accounts. These types of traders will suffice with $1000-1500 per week, consistently. It appears this exact category of trader is the biggest victim of these prop trading firms. 9/10 of retail day traders are simply cannon fodder for the liquidity machines run by central banks. The 1/10 that do make it out of the grinder, are then thoroughly ostracized by the 'games' being played when its time to collect their pay from prop firms. The only reason why anyone does anything in life, for money, is because they do not know how to trade. So, the only reason why someone opens a trading subscription channel, teaching people how to trade off moving averages, is because they failed at trading themselves. The only reason people come up with any investment idea to sell to someone else, is because they failed to generate that income themselves. So many people fail at trading, and then go sell their services. People fail to realize, you are trading against an algorithm designed to colonize the market at the busiest times of day, while accumulating positions during all other times. Most people hate this fact. They hate the fact that markets are governed by highly accurate machines. This is why people fail. They fight against the whale. If 'humans' were in charge of markets, just imagine the mess we would have, especially in a dishonest criminally governed country like the US. So 90% of day traders fight the machine. Only the ones who have found consistency have realized otherwise. Being on the algo's side is the first step to turning profits. And when a trader makes this his/her strategy, that trader strikes fear into the hearts of these prop firms, because he/she will destroy the live sim and force them to pay consistently.
All very true. The 1 advantage of the funded account (if you pass and get a live funded acct) is--if you lose the $10K in 1 session (or $20k) altogether-- then all you have really lost was the payment for the challenge (around $1,100) - I believe $200k challenge with $10k daily loss limit and $20k max loss limit is approx $1100. Of course if it took you failing 3 challenges to finally pass then of course you have more invested than just $1,100 - but still - if you put $20,000 of you own money in a forex account and lose $20,000 then you are out the whole $20,000 - not $1,100 (or $3,300 if it took you 3 challenges) So while it doesnt make sense for everyone to try to get a funded account VS just using your own money - there are some financial merits of why it does make sense in some cases versus just risking your own $20,000
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I imagine you're with one of the firms where you're trading on a simulator even after you're "funded"? As far as I know, only two firms (E2T and TST) lets you trade a live account - effectively taking care of the massive conflict of interest with the trade-in-simulator-forever firms. TST seems to have limitations on withdrawals, so that pretty much makes E2T the only option if someone wants to go down this path at all. Topstep:
They probably filter out consistent profitable traders, and copy their trades on a larger "real" account. Because giving "real" $100k accounts to 10 people let alone more would involve a lot of paperwork and risk to the firm, so why not let everyone trade on a sim(profitable or not), and over-time filter the best ones and copy their trades on a larger company account,via some algo.