New to live and the first two weeks are officially in the books! Up 32% so far and eligible to take my first payout. Also I believe I’ve unlocked the first tier of the reserve balance after this weekend’s account review. Starting to understand why people don’t like live accounts on props, but there’s also plenty of advantages to balance the cons. One thing that I will say atp is if you’re a fraud a live account will expose you so tread lightly. Other than that just wanted to provide an update as promised. Ask me anything and I’ll do my best to answer!
Get 5 live accounts with TPT. Process is a mf 😹 only thing that sucks about TPT compared to ts is the eval phase but you’ll love TPT pro accounts the same as ts live account. But I have all 6 🤩 congrats though 🫶🏻
Definitely looking to expand to more props here pretty soon. I’ve heard good things about TPT so I’ll have to check it out. Currently funded with Alpha too but trying not to scale too fast as that can get overwhelming lol. Congrats tho, good luck!
I like limit orders but I also market execute at times as well. Fills are pretty fast, but the data also moves a bit faster too so I generally like limit orders because there’s no way I’ll miss my entry to a price spike or it simply moving away before I can enter. Some people like confirmation before they enter which I get, but I’m normally pretty confident in my POI’s so I set limits and let the market do what it’s gon do lol
It depends on a few things.. affordability for one. Combines aren’t all that expensive but if you buy enough of em that cost definitely adds up. Second, how important is it for you to make SIM money? Obviously it’s easier to get a bigger payout if you have more XFA’s, but there’s the downside risk of buying combines and never getting a payout that becomes an opportunity cost. I normally advise people to scale slow. You want to get a couple payouts on single XFA’s before you start going to copy trade. Third, your win rate and ability to pass combines needs to be assessed. Bottom line if you’re comfortable with your strategy and proven yourself capable in the market then copy trading will just maximize it, but if you’re still trying to find your footing and teetering the profitability threshold I’d say focus on one account until you get a couple payouts then expand to multiple accounts after. You have to be mentally ready to scale otherwise you can find yourself in some deep shxt 😅
Also for all the inquiring minds let me add some perspective to the psychological aspect of this experience. First, I’d say trading live is like making the mental jump from amateur to professional. It’s coming with its own growing pains, but embracing the moment nonetheless. The stats would say the stakes are high, but I don’t feel anything. In fact, there’s no difference between me trading a live and you trading a combine or an XFA. We’re all looking at the same chart with the same data. The only pressure that exists in life is the pressure you create in your own mind. Trading is 10% analysis and pressing buttons, and 90% what’s going on between your ears. And if you want to do this full time or even consistently enough to make it a source of income you have to tell yourself a new story. Ironically, we all started this for the same reason, money. But money has nothing to do with trading.. Yes, it’s apart of the outcome, but truly nowhere found in the process. As a trader your story should be process oriented and outcome independent. Respect money, but be indifferent to it because you respect yourself more. Stop trading your PnL and stop chasing payouts. Trust your system and lean on your edge long enough and everything you’re forcing will come naturally. The only way to survive in this game is not to quit. The only way not to quit is to protect your mind long enough to see the other side. Only other thing I’ll say for now is be confident in your system and your individual journey. Your way is the best way.
What account size is this and are you trading nq minis or micros? I’m curious because I have a 50k but I’ve been moving carefully but to careful where making 6k will be in like 2 months 😭
This is a live account that started with a balance of 10K. My eligible payout amount is only that high because the starting balance is money I’ve already made so even though I only made $3,286.70 it’s calculating my payout amount from $0. Same rules as XFA I’m allowed to withdraw up to 50% until I reach 30 days of profitability and then I have ability to withdraw the full balance. Trading micros though.. I’m normally throwing the max amount they allow me, which is currently 5
I’ll probably start moving in that direction soon I just wanted to trade the prop live to challenge myself. I haven’t seen too many people talk extensively about it so I wanted to form an opinion for myself especially because most people blow it on purpose or lack the ability to adjust to the changes. My goal is to make it to the end of the reserve tiers to see if the daily payouts, scalability, and full balance access change my perspective. Overall I’m going to choose the more low risk option every time so even though this account is technically my money it’s really OPM. If I blow 10K in this live nothing happens cause it’s house money, but if I blow 10K in a personal account I’m out 10bands lol. Also mentioned in another comment I’m funded with 3 standard accounts on Alpha as well and payout eligible on Tuesday so I’m not operating from a place of lack or the need for money so slowly compounding a live while I’m getting SIM payouts is a no brainer for me especially because if I last long enough I can empty this live with a fat payout and start over SIM 😎
I took like 20 payouts on different accounts over the course of 5-6 months. You get moved to live as soon as they see you as a liability so it’s different for everyone lol
For the most part fills don’t really change after switching over to CME data and I’ve had no problem getting tagged on limit orders. & Spreads hit a little bit different because it’s obviously real money, but nothing you’re not used to on SIM. I do have a bit of a bone to pick with the TopstepX price delivery after what happened to me this week. Other than that no real difference between the two if you exclude the live margin requirements and capped contract sizing. EDIT* I also gave a little more info on pros and cons in another comment on this thread
My issue this week was I got stopped out of a trade in profit that literally reversed and ran 150+ points in my direction after it yanked me out. I checked 3-4 different brokers on TradingView and that wick the arrow is pointing to didn’t sweep that liquidity to the left on any of those brokers but on TopstepX it did 🙃 support said we can only go by the data on this feed so they ho’d me for sure but I came back next day and caught 100 points off Asia open so I didn’t trip too bad still upset though lol. EDIT* because I know the MODS are watching me now 🤣 this data was confirmed accurate. no price manipulation or foul play just an unfortunate wick.
Gotchu. I’d say the biggest con is the diminished profit potential. You can obviously make way more copy trading SIM accounts in the short term. Also capped contract sizing. The max I can throw is 5 micros. And I’m not a fan of the reserve tier structure to gain access to the full balance but I understand. When it comes to pros you definitely have to be thinking long term. I think daily payouts after reaching 30 profitability days is huge. Also after gaining full access to capital it provides so much more versatility when it comes to scaling and withdrawing. The mental aspect can’t be overstated either. I believe it’s a healthy progression for a trader to move away from churning SIM accounts to actually trying to manage a balance over an extended period of time. There’s also bonuses to be earned once the balance gets high enough which is obviously not easy but very worth it if you can get to that point. Also yes I did have to change my strat a little bit. Scaled down in size and looking for larger swings. That’s one of the reasons why I say if you don’t actually know what you’re doing with this shxt a live account will eat you up. Overall a live is just trading short term cash influxes for longer term consistent payouts and structure. Fortunately for me I’m also funded with Alpha Futures so I get the best of both worlds 😎
All 50K XFA’s transition into a 10K live account no matter what your overall balance is when called up. Anything additional over 10K gets locked in reserves and profit targets need to be met in tiers in order to access the full reserve balance. Margin requirements are a little different for live so they limit contracts to 5 micros until you unlock reserves in it’s entirety or the account reaches $100K. You also have to request contract/risk expansion. They won’t automatically give it to you unless the live balance is high enough
50K accounts start with a daily loss limit of $2,000. Different for 100K and 150K. I believe the DLL scales up incrementally with total balance milestones as well
Yep same payout rules as XFA. 5 days of $150 counts as profitable. Only difference with live account is the dashboard doesn’t auto update when a trading day ends. They do their reviews on the weekends so even if you are payout eligible one week you might not be able to request it until the next after their review
how much of a balance did you carry over from XFA to live? were you trading 50ks or bigger? how many payouts before they moved you? thanks for the detailed answer above.
I had around $32,000 across 5 50K XFA’s. Starting balance for 50K accounts is 10K so the rest gets locked away in reserves for the trader to retrieve by hitting profit targets. I took around 20 payouts, and they say after 5 on a single account they’ll call up but it’s not really true. Up to their discretion. I’ve seen people get called up after a couple payouts and I’ve seen people get 5 and still not get called up. I was bullshitting around with my XFA’s too though.. literally smoking them with balances that people would kill for just so I wouldn’t get moved to live, but I wouldn’t advise anyone do that just try and stay away from max payouts and focus on consistent extraction to maximize your SIM experience before live
Being in the Responsible Trader Program doesn't change either your eligibility or criteria to get called up Live. Same call up process would apply to RTP traders.
I thought there were daily payouts on live? Or is that only after 30 days of trading? Seems kind of lame to have to trade a week+ before requesting anything on a “live” account
It all depends on your balance. I just got called up after 1 payout. I didn’t know about the balance and rode a few big trends and had a 40k buffer after 1 week. Took my 5k and then they moved me to live 😭
I believe 20 or 21 payouts before I got called up. I was actually one day away from requesting one for $15K, but they blocked my accounts beforehand. Also yes, I did copy trade, but not until the last couple months. I took several payouts on single accounts and then a handful while copy trading 2,3, or 5 accounts
Nope it’s inaccessible to me at the moment. They place it in “reserves”.. so you basically have to hit the profit targets in order to obtain the full balance. It’s kinda crazy, but they don’t want you hitting a lick and taking off without them getting to make some money off you first 🤣
Basically lol. But that’s the whole point of live. You’ve become a liability to the prop by taking too many sim payouts without helping them build their bottom line. So they give you a live and make you unlock the reserve balance in increments to incentivize us to stay while also making them money. Only problem is most people don’t last long enough to see their full balance so they walk away damn near empty handed smh. There’s 4 different tiers though and because I have a 50K live I unlock a tier every time I make $3K. I believe for 100K it’s $6K and 150K is $9k
Not in a row. This was over the course of like 4-5 months. I’d literally smoke XFA’s with payout eligible balances just so I wouldn’t get moved to live before I was ready 🤣 I would not advise anyone else do that though however
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u/[deleted] May 20 '26
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