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I started a new evaluation challenge with a funded trader firm called TradeDay. I believe that right now (since March/April of this year) TradeDay have he best funded trader rules and the best withdrawal rules.
Let me preface this by saying that I have been trading low cap breakouts for a couple of years, but eventually decided that it's just not for me. Too many scams taking place, hardly anything makes sense in the low cap world plus constantly scanning for new stocks/news is exhausting and I have a full-time job. I did however do OK-ish and make some money trading those plays.
So some time last autumn I switched to futures (ES specifically) and did a couple of evaluation challenges. It was alright - not great, but not terrible either. Then I started a new job and took a good 4-5 month break from trading.
Right now I'm back to some very light trading - 30 mins to maybe 1-2 hours/day tops. ES only, one mini contract at a time.
So far I have finished 3/10 days of the TradeDay 10 day evaluation program, so a long way to go.
I'm doing their 50k challenge with a profit target of $2500, max loss of $1250 and a minimum requirement of 10 trading days where you have to trade "normally" (a bit ambiguous this one) and no single day can make up more than 30% of total profit in the account.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
Welcome back to trading. Trading the ES is truly the most exciting contract to trade in my opinion. I wish you much luck and happy trails. How do you make your trading decisions? Technicals on charts? Do you use a DOM?
To answer your questions: I base my trading decisions on daily->hourly->15 min key levels. So I trade mostly the 15 min chart, but I never want to be caught unprepared when a 1 hour or daily level is hit. I hope this makes sense! And no - I do not use the DOM. Normally I have the daily, 1 hour and 15 min charts open and then I also use VWAP on 1 hour and 15 min charts. That's all.
Update for the day:
So far I have finished 4/10 days of the TradeDay 10 day evaluation program. Hit the required profit target already, but I still have to trade for 6 more days to finish my evaluation.
For me the worst part of these funded trading challenges is the very first 2-3 days where the allowed max drawdown is so low that just 7-8 bad trades mean you're probably out. And I really dislike micros for their commision structure and just the psychological game of trading for such small gains. Once you build up a bit of a cushion things are easy as long as risk management stays in place. So with that said, even if I pass the evaluation successfully, there's this extra step of starting from $0 in a funded account with a max drawdown of $1250. Hate that part.
Daily update. Have loads of "normal" work to do today so going to stay out of the markets for the most part. Made 3 trades - took one silly loss (moved my SL up by 2 pts), then made it back and a few $ of profit.
Edit: a couple more trades later in the day, made a couple hundred more.
So far I have completed 5/10 days of the TradeDay 10 day evaluation program. So 5 more days to finish my evaluation. Profit goal met so I'm just trading normally for the rest of my eval.
Thanks! And nope - I just like TradeDay for their no bullshit rules: one step eval, no daily max drawdown, no withdrawal limits when funded and no sim accounts in funded. So basically pretty straightforward compared to the rest. I've also done TopStep steps 1 and 2 some months ago, but failed out of express funded due to greed.
Daily update:
So far I have completed 6/10 days of the TradeDay 10 day evaluation program. So 4 more days to finish my evaluation. Profit goal met a couple days ago.
Today I didn't trade well at all, but mostly because I was busy working/distracted and started to feel too comfortable having built up a cushion for the eval. Overtraded, broke some SL rules, just overall crappy trading really. Still positive by a couple hundred $$.
solid work! will definitely keep following, sounds like you got it in the bag tho.
I was considering topstep since theyre US based but will definitely check out tradeday. im also trading off NT and that would def be a requirement that I could still use it
Pretty sure TradeDay are US based as well. I had passed TopStep's 2-step evaluation some months ago, but then they put you on a sim account again (for the third time, but it's called "express funded") and only after you make another $10k or so they will transition you to funded. It's not a bad deal, but just the number of steps that you have to go through is a bit ridiculous/complicated. So I prefer TradeDay - pass a single straightfroward evaluation "step" and get a funded account. If you make money - feel free to withdraw whatever you want without any hoops to jump through.
I believe both programs support NT as well as many other platforms.
So far I have completed 7/10 days of the TradeDay 10 day evaluation program. So 3 more days to finish my evaluation. Profit goal met a couple days ago.
Note: really not feeling it today. Have a bad stomach bug, had fever all night, should have stayed away from markets. My first red day with a $198 loss. Still up over the required profit goal.
Edit: took one additional trade later in the day for a total profit of $250 and ended the day at $47 in profit.
