fwiw: received the funded acceptance email from TST today... completed 10-day process with 100% win rate. Next personal goal is collecting $5,000 wired in asap. Then working towards increasing max contract size over time until trade executions liquidity becomes a real consistent problem
Well done. You have achieved what most can't. I hope you go on and take big checks. Prepare for the neg heads to pounce.
I actually think most traders who are serious about success, can. But most traders aren't mentally prepared for what success really demands... especially in modern financial markets with their constant algo-riddled spikes and chop all night & day. In my personal case, I've evolved the trade-management side to much more defensive and "scalpy" than ever before in the past. Unrealized gains are usually abrupt and fleeting, gotta be willing to scratch out a bunch of trades thru the chop in order to lock in gains when whatever symbol traded actually makes a directional swing move. imo too many aspiring traders say they want to trade in a manner that is "their style". Newsflash: if a trader isn't consistently profitable, they don't have a style. Well they do, but it's a loser = net donor "style" to traders who adapt for whatever means it takes to succeed.
I completed two combines successfully, and several others prior unsuccessfully. Of those others, very first two met all parameters successfully on the CL side while second symbols (ES, ZS) failed to qualify. Part of the failures were due to 10-day limits before the continuous combine choice existed, and part of the failures were directly due to the fact that I did not take the process seriously enough. Hey it's just sim mode, right? How hard can this be? Hey, it's just pretend money, why not try a flyer trade here and a probe trade there? Those type of thoughts and many others which dismiss the process as anything less than real-cash degree of difficulty will not work. The major difference in pass versus fail is mental adjustment = mental attitude, imo. I've been trading long enough to recall when SOES bandits were mainstream, when stock splits and earnings runs mattered, before Russell 2000 and Dow futures had yet to be created, before VIX was a traded instrument, before HFTs and algos were ever spoken about in mainstream media, before anyone would believe the government actually manipulated financial markets in any way. In other words, I've been around awhile
Awesome. I've read back through a few of the old threads before I took a go at it. A lot of people seemed pretty negative on it. Made me want to try more.
It appears from their website that Topstep has abandoned 10-day Combines: only continuous Combines seem to be offered, now?
Correct. The funny thing is, had you told them this 1 year ago, they would have called it a stupid idea... Basicly the candy got sweeter, as long as you don't break the rules, sooner or later you will reach the profitgoal. Of course you are most likely will fail the LTP, but that is the other side of the candy...
Funded trader preparation? That appears to have the same parameters as the Combine, but with a lower profit target?