Verdict: A credible payer at a competitive price for traders who respect a dense rule set, but unregulated, simulated-capital, and carrying an operator track record that demands caution. We score it 7.4 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Proprietary trading firm founded November 2022, HQ Dubai. CEO/founder Khaled Ayesh; Group MD Andria Evripidou (ex-FCA, ex-Revolut) appointed Aug 2025. Reported structure: ANKH PROP FZCO (UAE reg 19948) plus Comoros entity (reg HY01223081). Ranked 4th Rising Star, Deloitte ME Tech Fast 50 (2024) | FundingPips ↗ |
| Regulatory status | NOT a regulated broker anywhere. FXEmpire: “operates without formal regulatory oversight”; WikiFX ~1.2/10, unregulated. The Comoros/MISA “licence” offers no protection — the Central Bank of Comoros declared the MISA register a fictitious entity (15 June 2022). All accounts are simulated/demo capital | FXEmpire ↗ |
| Evaluation model | Four paths plus a Prime career path: 1-Step, 2-Step Standard, 2-Step Pro, and Zero (instant funded). No time limits on any evaluation. Profit targets: 1-Step 10%; 2-Step Standard 8% then 5%; 2-Step Pro 6% then 6%; Zero none | FundingPips ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | One-time fees by size (2-Step Standard): $5K $36, $10K $66, $25K $156, $50K $289, $100K $529. Pro/1-Step/Zero priced separately. Refund trigger unconfirmed: legacy terms refunded after the 4th payout (1-Step / 2-Step Standard only); some 2026 reports of a first-payout refund — confirm current terms | FundingPips ↗ |
| Max drawdown | 1-Step 6% STATIC, 2-Step Standard 10% STATIC, 2-Step Pro 6% STATIC, Zero 5% TRAILING (equity-based; floor trails peak equity up then locks permanently at the initial balance once +5% profit is reached). 2-Step Standard daily loss 5% (baseline = higher of balance/equity at day start; floating + closed P&L count) | FundingPips ↗ |
| Profit split & payouts | Standard plans (1-Step & 2-Step identical): 60% weekly, 80% bi-weekly, 90% on-demand (35% consistency rule), 100% monthly. 2-Step Pro 80%; Zero 95% bi-weekly (15% consistency). Hot Seat scaling up to 100% split and $2M. Min withdrawal 1% of balance (2% on-demand); processing typically within 24h; $0 firm-side fee; KYC before first payout | FundingPips ↗ |
| Platform & products | MT5 (own MetaQuotes licence since 16 Mar 2025; US/Canada excluded), cTrader (+$20 surcharge), Match-Trader. No MT4. Underlying broker/liquidity post-BlackBull not disclosed. Forex, metals, indices, energies, crypto. Commissions $2.50/lot round-turn forex (1-Step / 2-Step Standard), $7/lot (Pro / Zero) | FundingPips ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
| Platform | Score | Sample | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot (community sentiment) | 4.5 / 5 (“Excellent”) | ~52,000–55,000 reviews (mid-2026, secondary-sourced) | Source ↗ |
| WikiFX | ~1.2 / 10 (unregulated) | broker profile | Source ↗ |
| Payout Junction (on-chain payout tracker) | ~$216M paid | 171,000+ transactions (Mar 2026) | Source ↗ |
| Aggregate | 4.5 / 5 | ~52,000–55,000 Trustpilot reviews (secondary-sourced) | Normalized by TheFXGeek |
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“NONE OF THE SERVICES PROVIDED TO YOU BY THE PROVIDER CAN BE CONSIDERED INVESTMENT SERVICES... NONE OF THE SERVICES CONSTITUTE INVESTMENT ADVICE OR RECOMMENDATIONS.”
FundingPips Terms of Service, FundingPips Terms & Conditions, accessed June 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:$529 one-time, refund trigger unconfirmed
One-time evaluation fee; legacy refund after 4th payout (1-Step / 2-Step Standard only), some 2026 reports of first-payout refund. Confirm current terms.Based on the the $100K 2-Step Standard Challenge at FundingPips pricing ↗, accessed June 2026. Standard plan, MT5/Match-Trader; $2.50/lot round-turn forex commission applies. The honest cost is the fee plus commissions plus the risk a rule ends the account before any payout..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Recurring community theme: traders on Trustpilot (4.5/5, ~82% five-star) widely report fast sub-24-hour payouts and responsive support. (Framed as aggregated community sentiment; the direct Trustpilot profile returned a 403, so we do not attribute a verbatim five-star quote.)”
Trustpilot community sentiment, Trustpilot, mid-2026 source ↗
“Reported community theme: a trader who passed three 2-Step challenges on a merged $300K account with about $18,822 in profit was terminated mid-trade in April 2026, with the firm citing “account management, copy trading, trading in concert with others” and withholding the profit. (Presented as a reported allegation we cannot adjudicate, not a verbatim quote.)”
Trader allegation (Trustpilot), Trustpilot, Apr 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Independent on-chain payout corroboration (~$216M, 171K+ transactions, Mar 2026)
- Fast payouts, typically within 24 hours and often 6–12, with $0 firm-side withdrawal fee
- Static maximum drawdown on the 1-Step, 2-Step Standard, and 2-Step Pro plans
- No time limits on any evaluation
- Competitive one-time fees ($529 for a $100K 2-Step Standard)
- Flexible profit splits up to 100%, scaling to $2M capital via Hot Seat
- Multiple platforms (MT5, cTrader, Match-Trader) under its own MetaQuotes licence
Cons
- Not a regulated broker; the associated Comoros/MISA “licence” is a Central-Bank-declared fictitious authority with zero protection
- Zero instant model uses a 5% trailing drawdown that locks only at +5%
- Discretionary, conduct-based terminations (trade-idea aggregation, IP flagging, copy-trading allegations) are the top complaint
- Sister brand FundingTicks applied retroactive rule changes that wiped earned profits, then wound down
- Undisclosed post-BlackBull broker/liquidity; unconfirmed fee-refund trigger
Verdict: Tradeify is one of the stronger US futures prop firms on payout speed, drawdown design, and entry cost, but the non-refundable fees, retroactive country-ban and KYC-lockout complaints, and simulated capital mean you should read the agreement before you pay. Cautiously positive at 7.3 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | US futures-only prop firm operated by Tradeify Holdings, Corp., Boca Raton, Florida. Founder/CEO Brett Simberkoff (“Brett Simba”, ex-Simba Stocks LLC); co-founder/COO Vinan “Vinny” Mistry. Rose to prominence through 2024-2025; exact founding date is ambiguous (inactive 2021 filing, dissolved UK entity, Tradeify Funding LLC filed Oct 2024) | Tradeify ↗ |
| Regulatory status | The prop evaluation program is NOT a regulated brokerage relationship; the Funded Trader Agreement states the company holds no broker-dealer licence. A separate retail brokerage, Slay Markets (Tradeify Brokerage LLC), launched 19 May 2026 and self-describes as a CFTC-registered Introducing Broker / NFA member with NinjaTrader Clearing as FCM (specific NFA ID unverified; NFA BASIC unreachable) | GlobeNewswire ↗ |
| Evaluation model | Tradeify 3.0 (March 2026): Growth (1-phase eval, min 1 day, DLL, 35% consistency at payout), Select (1-phase, 40% consistency forcing ~3-day min, no DLL in eval), Lightning Funded (instant, no eval, progressive 20/25/30% consistency). Elite Live trades real CME capital after 5 cumulative approved payouts | Tradeify ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | One-time, no subscription, no activation fee. Growth $25K $99 / $50K $145 / $100K $255 / $150K $369. Select $25K $109 / $50K $165 / $100K $265 / $150K $369. Lightning $25K $345 / $50K $492 / $100K $660 / $150K $796. Strictly non-refundable (§7.1) | Tradeify ↗ |
| Max drawdown | END-OF-DAY trailing on all current accounts: trails the highest EOD closing balance, updates once daily at the close, not intraday, but enforced in real time. Locks once EOD balance exceeds start + max DD + $100 (e.g. $52,100 on a $50K/$2,000 account), after which the floor sits $100 above start ($50,100) permanently. ~$1,000 (25K) to ~$4,500-$5,250 (150K); confirm at purchase | Tradeify ↗ |
| Profit split | Growth & Lightning Funded keep 100% of the first $15,000 in cumulative payouts, then 90/10 (trader 90%) above; Select Funded is 90/10 from the first dollar; Elite Live is 90/10 | Tradeify ↗ |
| Payouts | Processed via Rise (Riseworks), secondary Plane; 7 days a week, typically 24-72h; KYC mandatory before first payout. Minimum from $250 (25K), scaling up. Homepage advertises “Over $200 million verified payouts” (self-reported counter ~$197.9M across ~80,867 transactions; not independently audited) | Tradeify ↗ |
| Platform & products | Futures only (CME/CBOT/COMEX/NYMEX). Connections: Tradovate (+ NinjaTrader 8, TradingView), Rithmic via TradeSea (+ Quantower, Sierra Chart), WealthCharts; chosen at purchase. In-account commissions ~$5.76 round-turn on e-mini index futures, ~$1.82 on micros. News trading allowed; hedging, copy trading, HFT bots and overnight holds prohibited | Tradeify ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“All funds in the trading account remain the sole property of the Company. The Trader acknowledges they have no ownership or claim over these funds, which are exclusively demo funds unless otherwise stated.”
Tradeify Terms of Service, Funded Trader Agreement, simulated accounts clause, accessed June 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:$145 one-time, non-refundable
One-time evaluation fee, strictly non-refundable per §7.1; no subscription, no activation fee, no first-payout rebateBased on the the $50K Growth 1-phase challenge at Tradeify pricing ↗, accessed June 2026. Standard un-discounted fee; true cost-to-funded adds in-account commissions (~$5.76 round-turn e-minis, ~$1.82 micros) with no fee refund..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“extremely fast payout i requested it at 6pm and got it in my account by 8pm crazy never seen a prop firm payout that fast.”
carolyn, Trustpilot (via PipBack), 26 Nov 2025 source ↗
“Its has been wonderful experienced. Very fast payout. I just don't understand why suddenly banned Malaysia.”
Assyakirin Muhamad, Trustpilot (via PipBack), 11 Jul 2025 source ↗
Pros
- One-time fees with no monthly subscription and no activation fee (Tradeify 3.0, March 2026)
- End-of-day trailing drawdown that does not move intraday, more forgiving than an intraday high-water-mark trail
- Strong 90/10 split, with Growth and Lightning keeping 100% of the first $15,000 in cumulative payouts
- Fast payouts via Rise, processed 7 days a week, typically 24-72h and often within an hour per user reports
- Large, broadly positive review base (~4.6/5 across ~2,700+ reviews as reported)
- Cheap entry tiers ($99-$369 Growth) versus subscription-model peers
- Futures-only, never on MetaTrader, so it avoided the 2024-25 MT-prop collapse; no regulator action found
- Wide platform choice (Tradovate, Rithmic/TradeSea, WealthCharts) and competitive futures commissions
Cons
- All fees strictly non-refundable (§7.1), with no fee rebate on first payout
- Payout total ($197.9M) is self-reported with no independent audit or public ledger
- Reported KYC/Rise lockouts with no resubmission path and retroactive country bans (e.g. Malaysia) with no refund
- Aggressive enforcement: hedging (§6.7) and chargebacks trigger immediate or permanent termination, with disputed hard-termination complaints
- Heavy reliance on third-party platforms; 1,238+ tracked NinjaTrader outages since Nov 2024, including a multi-week 2026 outage
- Funded accounts are simulated; only Elite Live (after 5 approved payouts) trades real capital
Verdict: A strong, long-established futures firm with a trader-friendlier drawdown and real payout history, currently dragged by a serious reliability and trust cluster. Cautiously positive at 7.2 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Real Chicago firm since 2010 (as Patak Trading Partners); Trading Combine launched 2012 as TopstepTrader; rebranded Topstep 2020. Founder/CEO Michael Patak, ex-CME floor trader. FIA member since Oct 2023 | Topstep ↗ |
| Regulatory status | The prop evaluation is NOT a regulated brokerage relationship — Combine + Express Funded are simulated. A separate Topstep Brokerage LLC is a CFTC-registered Introducing Broker / NFA member (NFA ID 0567079) with no disciplinary actions; Topstep Advisory LLC took NFA CTA/Swap registration ~May 2026 | NFA ↗ |
| Evaluation model | 3-stage: Trading Combine (monthly-subscription evaluation, no min days, no time limit) → Express Funded Account (simulated, real payouts) → Live Funded Account (real CME capital, cleared via Plus500US, invited by the risk team) | Topstep ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | 50K $49/mo / 100K $99/mo / 150K $149/mo (Standard path) plus a one-time $149 Express Funded Activation Fee; No-Activation path $95/$149/$229 skips it. Recurring monthly subscription that rebills until you pass or cancel; no refund disclosed | Topstep ↗ |
| Max drawdown | Max Loss Limit, END-OF-DAY trailing: $2,000 / $3,000 / $4,500 (50K/100K/150K). Rises on end-of-day balance, never moves down, locks once it reaches the starting balance. Daily Loss Limit $1,000 / $2,000 / $3,000 | Topstep Help Center ↗ |
| Profit split | 90/10 in the trader's favour from the first dollar for sign-ups on/after 12 Jan 2026; legacy grandfather (earlier sign-ups) keeps 100% of the first $10,000 lifetime profits, then 90/10 | Topstep ↗ |
| Payouts | Minimum $125. Express Funded standard path needs 5 winning days of $150+ net each (consistency path: 3 days at/below 40%). Aeropay instant (no fee), Wise 1-3 days (no fee), ACH/Wire $30. Self-reported $1.4B+ paid and 92.26% approval (not independently audited) | Topstep ↗ |
| Platform & products | TopstepX (proprietary, built on ProjectX) with integrated TradingView charts; no external TradingView connection and no algo/automated trading. CME Group futures only. Commissions ES/NQ $3.80, MES $1.24 round-turn | Topstep ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“The MLL is a trailing limit. It rises as your end-of-day balance grows, but never moves down. Once it reaches your starting balance, it locks permanently.”
Topstep Terms of Service, Maximum Loss Limit, Topstep Help Center, accessed June 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostEvaluation cost for a funded account
Cost to get funded:from $49/month + $149 one-time activation
Recurring monthly Combine subscription plus a one-time $149 Express Funded Activation Fee (Standard path); no refund disclosedBased on the the $50K Trading Combine (Standard path) at Topstep pricing ↗, accessed June 2026. Cost assumes passing the Combine quickly; the monthly subscription rebills until you pass or cancel, so a slow evaluation can cost far more than the headline figure..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Recurring community theme: traders widely report fast, automated payouts, often arriving within 24 hours via Aeropay or Wise with no Topstep fee. (Framed as a community theme; the direct Trustpilot page returned a 403, so we do not attribute a verbatim five-star quote.)”
Trustpilot community sentiment, Trustpilot, 2025–2026 source ↗
“On April 8th, one account reached a profit of $3,700 USD. I was only four winning days away from being eligible for another payout. However, as I approached this goal, Topstep abruptly froze my accounts.”
BBB complainant, BBB, 18 Apr 2026 source ↗
Pros
- End-of-day trailing Max Loss Limit is friendlier than the intraday-trailing models used by peers like Apex
- 90/10 profit split from the first dollar for sign-ups on/after 12 Jan 2026
- Cheap entry from $49/month on the 50K Combine
- Transparent, competitive commissions (ES/NQ $3.80, MES $1.24 round-turn)
- 14-year-old real entity with a named founder and a separate NFA-registered brokerage arm
- Fast, automated payouts via Aeropay/Wise with no Topstep fee
- No minimum trading days and no time limit on the Combine evaluation
Cons
- Recurring BBB complaints of account closures near payout for alleged rule violations
- 11 company-acknowledged TopstepX/ProjectX outages in late 2025 with weak remediation
- Sept–Oct 2025 data incident exposed ~1,920 users' names, addresses, and SSNs
- Active McCrudden lawsuit alleges an unregistered CPO running a deceptive fee-collection scheme (unproven)
- Monthly-subscription model with no disclosed refund can cost far more than the headline fee
Verdict: Apex pays, visibly and at scale, and the one-time fee plus 100% split make it the cheapest credible route to funded CME futures. Just go in knowing that both drawdown tracks trail, there are no resets, and a 100K Performance Account can never return more than about $18,000 in its lifetime. 7.1 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Apex Trader Funding Inc, an active Texas Profit Corporation (SOS File No. 0804167818, Taxpayer ID 32080325627) chartered 27 July 2021 at 2028 E Ben White Blvd, Austin TX, an address that matches the site footer exactly. Founder and CEO Darrell Martin, who also founded Apex Investing Institute in 2008. Roughly five years operating | Texas records ↗ |
| Regulatory status | Unregulated. Not an NFA member and not CFTC-registered; its own Terms state Apex “is not a broker-dealer, futures commission merchant, or financial advisor.” All evaluation and Performance Accounts are simulated: “no real capital is at risk and no live market execution occurs.” Payouts are real money, the trading is not. No CFTC action and NOT on the CFTC RED List. No regulator backstops a disputed payout | Apex Terms ↗ |
| Evaluation model | One-step evaluation, then a Performance Account (PA). Minimum 1 day to pass and no consistency rule during the evaluation. Two tracks sold: Intraday Trailing and End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing, in 25K/50K/100K/150K sizes. “Apex 4.0” (1 Mar 2026) replaced monthly subscriptions with one-time fees and scrapped the MAE and One-Direction rules; pre-March-2026 accounts stay on legacy rules | Apex ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | Intraday: 25K $199 → $19.90, 50K $249 → $24.90, 100K $399 → $39.90, 150K $599 → $59.90. EOD: 25K $390 → $39, 50K $490 → $49, 100K $790 → $79, 150K $1,490 → $149 (list → price under the sitewide SAVENOW coupon live 12 Jul 2026). Non-refundable, non-transferable, NO resets, NO extensions. A second mandatory PA Activation Fee is payable within 7 days of passing and its amount is not published anywhere on the site | Apex ↗ |
| Max drawdown | BOTH tracks trail; there is no static option. Intraday follows the highest intraday peak and is “enforced in real time, including unrealized PnL,” so an unbanked spike permanently raises the floor. EOD recalculates once daily at 4:59:59 PM ET off the highest end-of-day balance and is the more forgiving of the two. Lock point varies: PAs stop at starting balance + $100, Rithmic/WealthCharts evals at profit target + $2,000, and Tradovate evals never stop trailing. Buffers $1,000 / $2,000 / $3,000 / $4,000; EOD accounts also carry a $500–$2,000 daily loss limit | Apex Help Center ↗ |
| Profit split & payout cap | 100% split on sim-funded PAs, with no cut taken. But each PA is capped at SIX payouts, each individually capped, then force-closed “regardless of the total profit generated in the account.” Lifetime ceilings: 25K $6,000; 50K $13,000 (EOD) / $14,500 (Intraday); 100K $18,000 / $18,500; 150K $20,500 / $21,500. After six payouts you must pass a new evaluation to get another PA | Apex Help Center ↗ |
| Payouts | Advertised “up to weekly.” Minimum 5 qualifying trading days (non-consecutive, no deadline), each clearing a minimum daily profit ($100–$350 by size and track). Minimum payout $500. Safety Net (drawdown limit + $100) must hold for the life of the PA and only profit above it is withdrawable. A 50% consistency rule blocks the payout request until the ratio corrects, but does not fail the account. Self-reported $810.87M paid since 2022, unaudited, alongside a live public payout ledger | Apex payouts ↗ |
| Platform & products | Rithmic (unlocking NinjaTrader, Sierra Chart, Bookmap, Quantower, ATAS, Jigsaw), Tradovate (browser, TradingView integration) and WealthCharts. CME Group futures only, with no forex spot, CFDs or crypto; Apex never ran on MT4/MT5. Level 1 data included, depth-of-market billed by the vendor. All automation, AI, algos and HFT prohibited; no overnight holds (flat by 4:59 PM ET); max 20 active PAs | Apex ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
| Platform | Score | Sample | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot | 4.3 / 5 | 20,156 reviews (82% 5-star, 9% 1-star) | Source ↗ |
| Aggregate | 4.3 / 5 | 20,156 Trustpilot reviews | Normalized by TheFXGeek |
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“Each Performance Account may receive a maximum of six payouts... PAs are limited to the max payouts specified below, regardless of the total profit generated in the account. After 6 payouts, the PA is closed, and you will be able to obtain another PA by qualifying for another evaluation.”
Apex Trader Funding Terms of Service, EOD Payouts / Intraday Payouts, Apex Help Center, accessed July 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:$39.90 one-time, non-refundable (+ undisclosed activation fee)
List $399, discounted to $39.90 under the sitewide SAVENOW coupon live 12 Jul 2026. Non-refundable, non-transferable, no resets, no extensions. A separate mandatory PA Activation Fee is payable within 7 days of passing and is not published on the site.Based on the the $100K Intraday Trailing Evaluation at Apex Trader Funding pricing ↗, accessed July 2026. Basis: Apex's live product picker, 12 Jul 2026. Apex's own help centre states discounts run between 50% and 90% depending on the current offer, so list prices are rarely the price paid. A higher-priced “No Activation Fee” variant of the same evaluation was listed at $1,090 → $109..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Apex Trader Funding was true to their commitment to honor the payout. I'll continue purchasing accounts with Apex and would definitely recommend to anyone to give the firm a fair try. Trade within the rules and earn.”
Scott A, Trustpilot, 12 Jul 2026 source ↗
“Once I made payout froze account for verificatoin, did that on phone and sent “3” full trading videos, then they emailed me and closed my account for fraud without stating what fraud because there was none.”
Paul Harris, Trustpilot, 10 Jul 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Live, public, rolling payout ledger listing individual approved payouts by date, country and amount, a transparency feature almost no rival offers
- $810.87M self-reported paid since 2022, internally consistent with a dated Feb 2024 press milestone of “just over $100 million”
- 4.3 / 5 from 20,156 Trustpilot reviews, with 82% at five stars
- True 100% profit split on sim-funded Performance Accounts, with no cut taken by Apex
- Very low entry cost under near-permanent discounting: $19.90 for a 25K Intraday evaluation, $39.90 for a 100K
- One-step evaluation, minimum 1 day to pass, and no consistency rule during the evaluation itself
- Apex 4.0 (1 Mar 2026) abolished the MAE / 30% negative-P&L rule and the “One Direction” rule, and relaxed consistency to 50%
- Verifiable Texas corporation (SOS File No. 0804167818, chartered 27 Jul 2021) with a named founder and a filed address matching the site footer
Cons
- Six-payout hard cap: every Performance Account force-closes after six payouts regardless of profit generated, so a 25K tops out at $6,000 and a 150K at roughly $21,500 for life
- Both drawdown tracks trail and there is no static option; the Intraday track trails on unrealised P&L, and a Tradovate evaluation's drawdown never stops trailing at all
- No refunds, no resets, no extensions: the evaluation dies at 6:00 PM ET on Day 30 and a failed one must be rebought at full price
- The mandatory PA Activation Fee amount is not published anywhere on the site and appears only at checkout, after the evaluation fee is paid
- “NO Payout Denials” on the homepage sits above a footer disclaimer that “reward payouts are discretionary”, and live one-star reviews describe payout freezes and video demands
Verdict: One of the best payout machines in futures prop, and unusually honest about its own trailing drawdown and its own dismal pass rates. The structural risks (unregistered, sim-only, terminable at will, a founder whose other prop firm just wound down) are what cap the score. We score it 6.9 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | MyFunded Futures, LLC — Frisco, Texas (2801 Network Blvd Ste 300); Texas law, venue Collin County / E.D. Texas. Founder and listed Director: Matthew Graham Leech. Brand operating since at least 2023 (Trustpilot profile claimed October 2023), but BBB records the entity as incorporated 9/29/2025 — an unexplained discrepancy. BBB rating B-, not accredited, 3 complaints. Leech also founded MyFundedFX, which rebranded to SeacrestFunded and shut down all prop trading on 6 February 2026 | BBB ↗ |
| Regulatory status | NOT registered with the NFA or CFTC; no NFA BASIC record as of July 2026. Normal for a futures prop firm (you are not depositing with a broker) but it means no regulator backstop, and the terms carry mandatory individual arbitration plus a class-action waiver. A July 2025 job posting described completing “our IB registration”; a year on it has not happened. No CFTC, NFA, state action or lawsuit naming the firm was found | Finance Magnates ↗ |
| Evaluation model | One-step evaluation, then a Sim Funded stage, then (for a small minority) a Live Funded stage via affiliated Blue Row Capital. Three plans: Builder ($50K, pass in 1 day), Rapid ($25K–$150K, 2-day minimum, “MOST POPULAR”), and Pro ($50K–$150K, 2-day minimum). Older Core and Flex plans are discontinued and their pages now 404 | MyFundedFutures ↗ |
| The firm's own success statistics | Published by MFFU for 1 Jan 2024 to 1 Jul 2025: 20.35% of evaluation accounts passed; 43.41% of all participants ever reached a Sim Funded stage (including those who bought multiple evaluations); of those, 28.56% ever earned at least one payout — so roughly one in eight buyers ever collects a payout. And 1.01% of sim-funded traders were ever promoted to a Live Funded account. Rare, creditable transparency, and a brutal picture of the odds | MyFundedFutures ↗ |
| Max drawdown | Varies by plan and stage. Builder: EOD TRAILING ($2,000 default / $1,500 add-on; floor starts $48,000). Rapid: EOD in evaluation, then INTRADAY TRAILING once sim-funded — “calculated intraday based on your peak balance, which includes both realized and unrealized gains” — locking permanently at max loss + $100. Pro: EOD at BOTH stages, no intraday trailing (the conservative choice). Even the EOD rule counts open losses: “open equity losses are taken into consideration when calculating whether or not the account failed on this rule.” No daily loss limit on Rapid or Pro; Builder's $1,000 DLL is a soft pause, not a kill switch | MFFU Help Centre ↗ |
| Profit split & payouts | Rapid 90/10; Builder and Pro 80/20. Rapid: daily payouts, $500 minimum, after a realized buffer of $1,100/$2,100/$3,100/$4,600 by size; no consistency rule once funded. Builder: every 48h, $500 min, up to $2,000 each. Pro: every 14 calendar days, $1,000 min, max $100,000 per user. MFFU states “About 80% of payouts auto-approve. Most clear in under a second,” with manual reviews “up to 6-12 business hours.” Paid via Riseworks (KYC), bank transfer or crypto. Scaling means promotion to real capital, not a bigger sim account: Pro's Live Funding Range is just $2,000–$5,000 on a $50K account | MFFU Help Centre ↗ |
| Platform & products | NinjaTrader (MFFU's stated most popular), TradingView, Tradovate, Quantower, Volumetrica, ATAS, plus in-house Fintevo and Deep Chart. Routing and data via Rithmic with a dxFeed partnership. CME-group listed futures only (CME, CBOT, NYMEX, COMEX) — no forex, CFDs, crypto, equities or options. Futures-only meant no exposure to the MetaQuotes crackdown that killed 80–100 forex props, but it inherits the sector's Rithmic infrastructure dependency | MyFundedFutures ↗ |
| Payout proof | MFFU advertises NO total-payout figure anywhere on its public site (no homepage banner; /payouts redirects to a login). Unusual restraint, but it also means there is nothing to check. Third-party trackers contradict each other by roughly 45% (PropScorer vs TheTrustedProp), neither discloses an audit methodology, so we publish neither. The only individually documented evidence is TraderPayout's archive of roughly 33 payout proofs across about 28 traders. No independently audited firm-wide payout total exists | TraderPayout ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“The funds provided to you for simulated trading are fictitious and… you have no right to possess those fictitious funds beyond the scope of their use within the Sites and Services.”
MyFundedFutures Terms of Service, Terms and Conditions, §10.15, accessed July 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:$126/mo promo, effectively non-refundable
Recurring monthly subscription. Refund only if no trading activity and no market-data access, within 14 days, minus a $75 non-refundable fee. “Once any trading activity occurs, all fees are fully earned.”Based on the the $50K Rapid plan (MFFU's most popular) at MyFundedFutures pricing ↗, accessed July 2026. Promotional price as displayed on 12 July 2026 (list $157). The subscription renews monthly until cancelled 3 business days before renewal, and there is no reset after a max-loss breach — you buy a new evaluation..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Sony was very helpful in clearing the queries. MFF also has the smoothest Payout process.”
Suraj Kumar (IN), Trustpilot, 10 July 2026 source ↗
“It's a scam. They closed my funded account for no reason saying max loss limit reached when I was well above 2K.”
Mohit Ojha (US), Trustpilot, 8 July 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Payout automation genuinely works: MFFU states around 80% auto-approve and most clear in under a second, with daily payouts on Rapid
- 90/10 profit split on Rapid with a $0 activation fee and a $500 payout minimum
- Publishes its own program-wide statistics, including the unflattering ones (20.35% evaluation pass rate; 28.56% of funded traders ever paid)
- Discloses Rapid's intraday trailing drawdown in a prominent “STRAIGHT TALK” section instead of burying it, and the trailing locks permanently at max loss + $100
- Consistency rule does not breach the account: exceeding 50% just means trading additional days
- Builder's $1,000 daily loss limit is a soft pause that ends the session, not the account
- Pro plan uses EOD drawdown at both stages, a genuinely conservative option most firms do not sell
- Eight platforms (NinjaTrader, TradingView, Tradovate, Quantower, Volumetrica, ATAS, Fintevo, Deep Chart); futures-only, so no MetaQuotes exposure
Cons
- Rapid's funded-stage floor trails unrealised equity, so giving back open profit on a winning day can end the account
- MFFU's own figures imply roughly one in eight evaluation buyers ever collects a payout, and only 1.01% of sim-funded traders ever reach real capital
- Not registered with the NFA or CFTC; the IB registration flagged in a July 2025 job posting is still not completed a year later
- Terms call funded balances “fictitious” and permit termination “at any time and for any reason… without prior notice,” with mandatory arbitration and a class-action waiver
- Recurring monthly subscription, effectively non-refundable once you access market data, with no reset after a breach; the founder's other prop firm (MyFundedFX / SeacrestFunded) shut down prop trading on 6 February 2026
Verdict: A legitimate, fast-paying firm that is easy to pass and hard to keep funded; worth it only if you respect the intraday PRO drawdown and bank profits rather than ride them. 6.8 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Real, active 2021 Florida entity (TAKEPROFITTRADER LLC, doc# L21000145354, effective 28 Mar 2021), Windermere FL, managed via Oslo Six entities tied to founder/CEO James M. Sixsmith (ex-hockey; founded Trade Context 2015). ~179 employees, unfunded; Sept 2025 senior hires from Schwab/Fiserv and BNY Mellon | Florida Sunbiz ↗ |
| Regulatory status | The prop program is NOT a regulated brokerage relationship — TPT is not a CFTC FCM/IB/CPO/CTA and not an NFA member, and is currently not required to register under its model. Test/PRO are simulated; only live PRO+ touches real markets, executed through Tradovate LLC, a genuinely CFTC-registered FCM / NFA member. No CFTC/NFA action names TPT or Sixsmith | CFTC/NFA BASIC ↗ |
| Evaluation model | One-step “Test” evaluation (monthly subscription, no time limit) → PRO (simulated-funded, real payouts) → PRO+ (live Tradovate, auto-promotion since 18 Mar 2026 after $5,000 PRO profit). Uniform 6% profit target; min 5 trading days before the PRO upgrade | Take Profit Trader ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | Test monthly fee $150 (25K) / $170 (50K) / $245 (75K) / $330 (100K) / $360 (150K); flat $100/mo before May 2026. Fee non-refundable once trading starts; one free reset per cycle, extra Test reset $100. PRO activation $130 one-time (often promo-waived), PRO+ $0; no monthly fee on PRO/PRO+. PRO resets $399–$1,499 by size (max 3). Pricing third-party-sourced (firm pages 403 at review time) | Third-party trackers ↗ |
| Max drawdown | THE SPINE. Test = END-OF-DAY trailing (updates once daily at 5pm ET close on the highest closing balance, does not move intraday, locks static at the starting balance). PRO = INTRADAY trailing (follows the real-time equity peak including unrealized gains; every new high tightens the floor). PRO+ = reverts to EOD trailing. Amounts $1,500 / $2,000 / $2,500 / $3,000 / $4,500. Daily loss limit removed Jan 2025 | Rule docs (third-party-reproduced) ↗ |
| Profit split | PRO 80/20, live PRO+ 90/10, applied from the first payout (not a 100%-first model). PRO withdrawals require clearing a buffer zone (starting balance + max drawdown, e.g. $50K must reach $52,000) before 80% unlocks; PRO+ has no buffer | Take Profit Trader ↗ |
| Payouts | On-demand once the PRO buffer is cleared (PRO+ none), no max cap; ~24 business hours to wallet then ~12h admin approval. $50 fee on withdrawals <=$250, free above. Plaid/ACH (US), PayPal/Wise (intl), Wise (LLC); 1099-NEC issued. No published audited cumulative payout total; all proof self-reported | Take Profit Trader ↗ |
| Platform & products | Futures only (no options); 15+ platforms including NinjaTrader, Tradovate, TradingView, Quantower and R|Trader, data via CQG/Rithmic. Commissions $5.00 std / $0.50 micro round-trip. Flat by 5pm ET daily, no overnight/weekend holds; contract limits scale by size and exceeding them fails the account. No proprietary mobile app | Take Profit Trader ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“On the PRO sim-funded account the trailing maximum drawdown is calculated intraday and tracks the account's highest real-time equity (including unrealized gains), so each new equity peak raises the loss floor; on the Test evaluation and on PRO+ the same trailing drawdown is instead measured end-of-day on the highest closing balance.”
Take Profit Trader Terms of Service, Drawdown rules (paraphrased from third-party-reproduced help content; firm pages returned 403), accessed June 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostCheapest path: $25K Test ($150/mo) + $130 PRO activation, often promo-waived
Cost to get funded:$150/mo + $130 one-time (often waived)
Test fee non-refundable once trading starts; one free reset per billing cycle; PRO activation $130 frequently promo-waived; no monthly fee on PRO/PRO+Based on the the $25K Test (one-step) plus PRO activation at Take Profit Trader pricing ↗, accessed June 2026. Cheapest path; pricing is third-party-sourced because the firm's own pages returned 403 at review time, and the Test rebills monthly until you pass or cancel, so a slow evaluation costs far more than the headline..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Just received my payout and also got the email to move to a live account, big milestone. Special thanks to admin Jenn for the support. From 2 accounts, I've now made $10K, and this is just the beginning.”
Trustpilot reviewer, Trustpilot, 2025 source ↗
“I am writing regarding the wrongful forfeiture of $7,000 in earned profits and the termination of my accounts, flagged for bot trading. TPT has failed to provide any technical proof (such as API logs or software) because none exists.”
BBB complainant, BBB, 23 Mar 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Genuinely fast, on-demand payouts (approvals within ~24h, funds same/next business day) dominate ~9,250 Trustpilot reviews
- Cheap, time-unlimited one-step Test (from $150/mo at $25K; flat $100/mo pre-May 2026)
- $130 PRO activation frequently waived by promo; PRO+ activation now $0 (auto since 18 Mar 2026)
- No daily loss limit since January 2025 across all phases
- Real, established 2021 Florida LLC with a named founder and ~179 staff
- Live PRO+ execution via Tradovate, a genuinely CFTC-registered FCM
- 15+ platforms (NinjaTrader, Tradovate, TradingView, Quantower, R|Trader), cheap commissions ($5 std / $0.50 micro), no max payout cap
- Forgiving EOD trailing drawdown and no news restriction on the Test evaluation
Cons
- The drawdown switch: forgiving EOD trailing on Test becomes punishing intraday trailing (tracking unrealized gains) on funded PRO, the root of “easy to pass, hard to keep”
- BBB “Not Rated” with an active Pattern of Complaints alert (234 complaints), including profit-forfeiture and termination complaints for unproven “bot trading” with “decisions are final” responses
- No published audited cumulative payout total; all proof self-reported
- Single-broker Tradovate dependency, exposed by the ~2-day Jan 28, 2026 outage with no backup route
- Unregulated, mostly-simulated product (only PRO+ is live); steep PRO resets ($399–$1,499)
Verdict: A real, three-year-old, paying prop firm with a better-than-average fee-reimbursement policy and static drawdown at no premium, undone by an unregulated contracting entity, unverifiable ownership, self-contradicting payout stats, and a well-corroborated pattern of evidence-free payout denials with no appeals route. We score it 6.0 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Contracting entity FXIFY Solutions Limited, UK company no. 14451720, incorporated 31 October 2022, registered office 142 Central Street, Clerkenwell, London EC1V 8AR. Sole active director David Paul Bhidey; Gope Shyamdas Kundnani resigned 5 July 2024. Sole Person with Significant Control is Briarwood Ventures Limited, a Hong Kong company, holding 75% or more of shares and voting rights plus the power to appoint and remove directors, so ultimate beneficial ownership is NOT publicly verifiable. Operating since roughly May 2023 (~3 years). Publicly promoted co-founders Bhidey, Peter Brown and Bobby Winters; Winters is simultaneously CEO of FXPIG, the stated backing broker, making this a related-party structure | UK Companies House ↗ |
| Regulatory status | NOT regulated. The entity you contract with, FXIFY Solutions Limited, is registered under SIC code 62012, “Business and domestic software development,” and holds no financial authorisation of any kind. A Companies House registration is a registration, not a licence. FXIFY advertises that “FXIFY Markets Ltd is licensed in Labuan, Malaysia, as a money broker under License No. MB/22/0097” — but that is a DIFFERENT company. The entity name is corroborated on the Labuan IBFC official list as “FXIFY Markets Ltd. (formerly known as Timios Global Markets Ltd.)”, revealing a prior name; the licence number itself appears only in FXIFY's marketing. A Labuan money-broking licence requires only RM500,000 paid-up capital and carries no compensation scheme or ombudsman | Labuan IBFC money-broker list ↗ |
| Evaluation model | One Phase, Two Phase (Classic / Standard / Pro), Three Phase, Lightning, Instant Funding and Instant Funding Lite. Targets: One Phase 10%; Two Phase Standard 10% then 5%; Two Phase Pro 4% then 8%; Three Phase 5% in each of three phases; Lightning 5% but within a hard 5-trading-day limit; Instant has no target. Minimum trading days: 5 on One Phase, 5 per phase on Two Phase Standard and Three Phase, 3 profitable days (0.5% minimum) on Two Phase Pro. Consistency rules: Two Phase Classic 25% (funded only), Lightning 30% (evaluation AND funded), Instant Lite 20%; NO consistency rule on One Phase, Two Phase Standard, Two Phase Pro or Three Phase. Inactivity: a trade must be placed at least once every 60 days | FXIFY checkout ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | List prices captured live at the checkout 12 Jul 2026, during a sitewide “WORLD CUP SALE: 26% OFF” (code GOAL26, excluding Instant Lite). One Phase and Two Phase share an identical ladder across ALL THREE variants: $5K $59, $10K $89, $15K $119, $25K $199, $50K $379, $100K $549, $200K $1,049, $400K $2,950. Three Phase $100K $399. Lightning $10K $59 to $100K $399. Instant Funding $2.5K $19 to $50K $289 (caps at $50K, no add-ons offered). Add-ons are percentage uplifts on the fee: Increase Leverage +25%, Increase Profit Split +20% (to 90/10), Bi-Weekly Payouts +5%, Performance Protect +15%. Stacking all four adds +65% to the fee | FXIFY checkout ↗ |
| Max drawdown | Split by variant, and this is the fact that matters most. STATIC: Two Phase Classic 10% (“the floor stays fixed at the starting balance”), Two Phase Pro 8% (“Static drawdown. The maximum loss level is fixed at the start of the evaluation and remains unchanged”), Three Phase 5% (based on initial balance). TRAILING: One Phase 6% (High Water Mark), Two Phase Standard 10%, Lightning 4%, Instant Funding 8% (locks at starting balance once 8% profit is reached or the first payout is processed), Instant Lite 4%. THE EQUITY TRAP: the trailing drawdown trails the High Water Mark on CLOSED balance, but the breach test runs on EQUITY, so open unrealised losses can breach you. The daily loss limit works the same way: “Daily Loss Limit is calculated based on the balance at the end of the previous day, the balance recorded at 5PM EST time.” THE WITHDRAWAL TRAP, verbatim: “When you request a withdrawal, the Max Drawdown locks at your starting balance, regardless of profits made… the buffer created by your profits is reduced by the amount withdrawn.” DISCLOSURE GAP: FXIFY's public rules FAQ lists a single undifferentiated “2 Phase Account … Max Drawdown: 10% Trailing” and never mentions the Classic / Standard / Pro split at all, while the live checkout sells exactly that split at identical prices | FXIFY rules FAQ ↗ |
| Profit split & payouts | Base split 80%. The advertised “up to 90%” is a PAID add-on costing +20% of the fee, not the standard deal. First payout on 1/2/3 Phase is on demand: “traders can request a withdrawal on-demand, as soon as the first trade on the live account is closed. There's no minimum amount. No minimum days.” Thereafter every 30 days, or every 14 days with the paid Bi-weekly add-on. Paid via RISE, bank wire or crypto (USDC/USDT), and “usually get processed within 3 business days” — though a live Trustpilot reviewer reported 16 days plus an interview. The account goes READ-ONLY while a payout is pending. Fee reimbursement: “Your purchase fee gets reimbursed to you with your first payout on request for 1,2 and 3 Phase plans” — Instant Funding is EXCLUDED. Hard breach: “If you have profits in your Funded account at the time of a hard breach, you are not entitled to the profits,” and the paid Performance Protect add-on (+15%) is what lets you withdraw profits after a hard breach anyway. Scaling requires a 10% return in the first 3 months with at least 2 profitable months; first scale-up +25%, then the balance doubles each scale-up, up to 4 scale-ups | FXIFY payouts page ↗ |
| Platform & products | MT4, MT5, DXtrade and TradingView. 100+ instruments across FX, indices, stocks and crypto. Leverage FX 30:1 (50:1 via paid add-on), indices 10:1, stocks and crypto 2:1. RAW or All-In pricing feeds. Stated backing broker is FXPIG (Prime Intermarket Group Eurasia Ltd, Mauritius FSC Investment Dealer licence GB21026537), which shares a principal with FXIFY. Capital is SIMULATED. EAs are allowed on evaluations but BANNED on Instant Funding and Lightning; copy trading is permitted only between your own FXIFY accounts. In August 2024 MetaQuotes directed FXIFY to “cease offering MetaTrader services to traders located in the United States,” and US traders were migrated to DXtrade. FXIFY has no official mobile app. The Instant Funding product page discloses NO drawdown, daily-loss, consistency, EA or refund rules at all, and its pricing widget renders a different product's prices | Finance Magnates ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
| Platform | Score | Sample | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot | 4.3 / 5 | 6,083 reviews — 78% five-star, 12% one-star (observed live 12 Jul 2026). Profile labelled “Asks customers to review”; FXIFY holds a paid Trustpilot subscription | Source ↗ |
| Trustpilot (FXIFY Futures) | 3.7 / 5 — “Average” | Separate profile; the futures arm rates materially worse than the forex arm | Source ↗ |
| TheTrustedProp (payout tracker) | $33.9M paid | 13,299 payouts, average $2,553, largest $119,698 — community-tracked, NOT audited and NOT on-chain verified | Source ↗ |
| Aggregate | 4.3 / 5 | 6,083 Trustpilot reviews, but the profile is review-solicited and the 1-star share (12%) is drifting up (12 Jul 2026) | Normalized by TheFXGeek |
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“PLEASE NOTE THAT IF YOU START PERFORMING DEMO TRADES BEFORE THE EXPIRY OF THE SPECIFIED TIME LIMIT, YOU LOSE YOUR RIGHT TO WITHDRAW FROM THE GTC.”
FXIFY Terms of Service, FXIFY General Terms & Conditions, clause 13.1 (capitalised in the original), accessed July 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:$549 one-time, reimbursed with your first payout
One-time evaluation fee. Reimbursed on request with the first payout on 1, 2 and 3 Phase plans. Instant Funding is excluded. “No refunds will be offered after the first trade is placed.”Based on the the $100K Two Phase Challenge (Classic, 10% static drawdown) at FXIFY pricing ↗, accessed July 2026. List price captured at the checkout 12 July 2026, during a sitewide 26% promo (GOAL26) that took the $100K One Phase to $406.26. Base 80% profit split; the advertised 90% split is a paid add-on costing +20% of the fee, and four stackable add-ons total +65%..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Finally I reach payout after breaching so many accounts, I have received my first payout it took 16 days for it to arrive in my bank account all went well it would be much better if FXIFY can make the payout process bit faster I had to go through an interview after reaching my payout stage. Thank you FXIFY I will be continue trading with FXIFY.”
sahina Patel (5 stars, Canada — labelled by Trustpilot an “Unprompted review”), Trustpilot, 6 Jul 2026 source ↗
“After an unjustified wait, I received an email in which, surprisingly, they denied my payment under the pretext of having used a prohibited trading strategy: latency arbitrage. This is completely FALSE. My trading is 100% manual. Furthermore, the account I was using was an instant account, which does NOT allow the use of bots or automated software. And as is well known, latency arbitrage without automated tools is virtually impossible to execute. In other words, the accusation has no technical or logical basis.”
PortafolioWin (1 star, Colombia — labelled by Trustpilot an “Unprompted review”), Trustpilot, 10 Jul 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Evaluation fee reimbursed with your FIRST payout on request on 1, 2 and 3 Phase plans, ahead of the sector norm of a deferred rebate
- First payout can be requested as soon as the first funded trade closes, with no minimum amount and no minimum days
- Static drawdown available on Two Phase Classic (10%), Two Phase Pro (8%) and Three Phase (5%) at the same price as the trailing variants
- Independent community tracker logs $33.9M across 13,299 payouts, average $2,553 (community-tracked, not audited)
- No consistency rule at all on One Phase, Two Phase Standard, Two Phase Pro or Three Phase
- Four platforms (MT4, MT5, DXtrade, TradingView), 100+ instruments, and a choice of RAW or All-In pricing
- No regulator warning, enforcement action or lawsuit naming FXIFY found across the FCA, ASIC, CySEC, BaFin, CONSOB or CFTC
- Roughly three years of operation, having survived the August 2024 MetaQuotes restriction that closed many peers
Cons
- The contracting entity, FXIFY Solutions Limited (UK no. 14451720), is registered under SIC 62012 as a software developer and holds no financial authorisation; the advertised Labuan licence belongs to a different company, FXIFY Markets Ltd
- Ultimate beneficial ownership sits behind Briarwood Ventures Limited, a Hong Kong company, and is not publicly verifiable
- FXIFY's public rules FAQ lists only “2 Phase Account … Max Drawdown: 10% Trailing” and never discloses the Classic (static) / Standard (trailing) / Pro (static) split sold at checkout at identical prices
- Dominant complaint theme: profitable traders denied at payout on an unevidenced “latency arbitrage” accusation, account closed and profit forfeited, with a rationale that contradicts FXIFY's own ban on EAs and bots on Instant Funded accounts
- The advertised 90% split is a paid add-on costing +20% of the fee (base is 80%); four stackable add-ons total +65%
- FXIFY's own payout counters disagree by roughly 20x on the same day (“250K+ payouts” on the homepage versus “12,500+” on the payouts page)
Verdict: Instant Funding pays, and it pays quickly, with more transparency on the payment rail than most of the sector. But it sells you two rule sets that contradict each other and reserves the right to decide at its own discretion whether you broke either one. We score it 5.8 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Two counterparties across two live contracts. ACELLO LTD, England & Wales, company no. 12696083, 30 Old Bailey, London EC4M 7AU, VERIFIED on Companies House: status ACTIVE, incorporated 24 June 2020, SIC codes 47990 (non-store retail) and 85590 (other education), i.e. not financial services. IF PRO LTD, St Lucia, reg. 2025-00056, is SELF-REPORTED ONLY and we could not confirm it on any registry. CEO Lewis Mansbridge. Acquired Funded Trading Plus in a seven-figure deal announced 26 May 2026, said to lift group revenue by 70% | UK Companies House ↗ |
| Regulatory status | NOT regulated. General Terms 7.1.2, verbatim: “The Services do not constitute FCA regulated investment services and thus you are not entitled to any regulatory protections.” Liability is capped at £10,000. We searched the FCA Warning List and FCA site search on 12 July 2026 for “Acello” and “Instant Funding” and found no current FCA warning naming the firm or its entities; we make no wider claim than that. There is no ombudsman and no compensation scheme to appeal a denied payout to | IF Pro General Terms & Conditions ↗ |
| The two-contract conflict | This is the defining fact. A buyer agrees to two live legal documents naming two different companies in two different jurisdictions, and they disagree on material terms. One-Phase max drawdown: 8% in the Account Agreement vs 6% in the General Terms. Instant Funding baseline profit split: 80% in the Agreement vs 70% in the General Terms. Account types: three in the Agreement, four in the General Terms (which adds a Three-Phase Challenge). Read alongside Agreement 7.10, which lets the firm decide “at its own discretion” what is a Forbidden Trading Practice, and GTC 9.6, which reserves the right to “unilaterally change the fees and parameters of the Services at any time, including the parameters for their successful completion” | Instant Funding Account Agreement ↗ |
| Max drawdown | Mixed, and partially undisclosed. The flagship Instant Funding account's “Smart Drawdown” is NON-TRAILING and balance-based: “Your account begins with a -10% drawdown from the starting balance… Once you achieve a 5% gain, your drawdown automatically adjusts to -5% of the starting balance. This new level becomes fixed permanently.” Note it steps DOWN, so banking 5% of profit halves your remaining rope. The firm confirms “For all programs except Instant Funding and Instant Funding GO, Max Loss is static.” BUT the firm also publishes a Trailing Drawdown page (“a trailing Drawdown level that follows/trails at 6% of your account balance… This will stop trailing once your +6% Profit”) which DOES NOT NAME which products it governs. A trailing drawdown exists in the rules and the firm does not clearly disclose where it applies | Instant Funding — Smart Drawdown ↗ |
| Risk limits & rule traps | Risk-per-trade limits are per product and tight: Instant Funding 3% of starting balance; Instant Funding GO and One-Phase Crypto 2%; IF Micro / IF Micro Crypto / IF1 1%; Two-Phase Micro 2% (≤$50k) or 1.5% (≥$100k). Master formula, verbatim: “Risking or losing more than 50% of the account's starting daily drawdown at any time in one trade idea is considered gambling, and constitutes a hard breach.” The Clarity line alone adds an “Account Drawdown” auto-close watching FLOATING equity (One Phase Clarity 2%, IF Micro Clarity 1.5%, Instant Funding Clarity 2.5%): first breach closes positions AND permanently cuts the profit split to 50%, second breach closes the account. Forbidden practices (Agreement 7.7.1) include HFT (60 seconds or less), tick scalping, martingale, grid trading, third-party EAs, group hedging, gap trading, and news trading without a paid add-on. The inactivity clause contradicts itself inside one document: “BREACH BY INACTIVITY (60 DAYS)” vs “ANY TRADING ACCOUNT IN-ACTIVE FOR 30 DAYS WILL BE AUTOMATICALLY SUSPENDED” | Instant Funding — Trading Rules ↗ |
| Profit split & payouts | 80% base per the Account Agreement, 90% via a paid add-on; the General Terms state a conflicting 70% baseline for the Instant Funding account. First payout 14 days after the first trade, then every 7 days after placing a new trade. Minimum payout $25. Paid via RISE (riseworks.io) or crypto, with “Crypto withdrawals … processed in USDC (ERC-20)” and “Standard processing: Within 48 business hours.” One-Phase Crypto requires net profit of at least 1.5% of starting balance before a first withdrawal. Agreement 16.3: on a first-ever daily-loss breach the customer receives “50% of the Reward”, an allowance “granted per Customer and not per each INSTANT FUNDING Account” | Instant Funding — Payouts ↗ |
| Platform & simulated capital | MT5, cTrader and Match-Trader. Account sizes $625 to $300,000, with scaling to $1.28M as a firm claim. MT5 runs on the firm's OWN main-label licence, regained in late Feb 2025 after the Feb-2024 MetaQuotes gray-label crackdown forced it off ThinkMarkets-routed MT5 and onto DXtrade then cTrader; plenty of firms never recovered that access. Capital is simulated. Agreement 1.8: “Instant Funding ONLY offers a Virtual Account; it does not offer any form of live funded account.” Agreement 2.1.16: “ALL PROFITS ARE SIMULATED PROFITS AND ARE NOT PROFITS GENERATED FROM REAL MARKET TRADING.” Agreement 8.4 (typos in the original) reserves the right to “copy or transmit custimers' simulated trades to trade for its own accounts … with Instant Fundings own live funds”, so you trade a demo and the firm may mirror your strategy with its own real money | Finance Magnates ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
| Platform | Score | Sample | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot | Rating SUPPRESSED — “This company's rating is unavailable due to a breach of our guidelines” | 4,704 reviews; 62% five-star, 26% one-star (observed live in-browser 12 Jul 2026) | Source ↗ |
| Firm's self-reported payouts | $18,741,928+ claimed since 2023 | Self-reported and unaudited. The firm does publish real, checkable on-chain wallets (its Tron address shows 7,387 transactions), but we did not reconcile the transfers against the claimed total | Source ↗ |
| Trustpilot enforcement policy | TrustScore “hidden from view” on a Consumer Warning | Triggers include fake reviews, incentivised reviews, biased invitations and misuse of flagging tools; Trustpilot does not say which applied | Source ↗ |
| Aggregate | No rating | Trustpilot rating suppressed for a guidelines breach; 4,704 reviews still visible (12 Jul 2026) | Normalized by TheFXGeek |
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“Instant Funding reserves the right to determine, at its own discretion, whether certain trades, practices, strategies or situations are Forbidden Trading Practices.”
Instant Funding Terms of Service, Instant Funding Account Agreement, Clause 7.10, accessed July 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:Fee not published outside checkout
List prices are not shown on any public page; pricing is gated behind the checkout flow and driven by stacked promo codes (OURBEST, BFBOOST, BF2090, STAR35, BFNEW). Refund terms could not be verified: the firm's refund help page returns a 404.Based on the Instant Funding and the One-Phase / Two-Phase Challenges, $625 to $300,000 at Instant Funding pricing ↗, accessed July 2026. Basis: instantfunding.com public pages, accessed 12 July 2026. We do not quote a price we cannot verify outside checkout, and a firm that never states an undiscounted price makes its own discount framing unfalsifiable..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“Hi all, it's been almost 8 months trading on IF 👑having best experience, everything is smooth, received more than 10payouts always without any issue, you should give a try. Best of luck”
Trustpilot reviewer (“Kingsman⚡”), Trustpilot, 30 Jun 2026 source ↗
“This is an absolutely useless company. All my hard work went to waste. I did everything perfectly, but they won't pay me because I violated the 2% risk rule per transaction. They closed my account. Shame on them. I haven't violated this rule, I need support.”
Trustpilot reviewer (“HACI BEYTULLAH SÜNBÜL”), Trustpilot, 1 Jul 2026 source ↗
Pros
- ACELLO LTD confirmed ACTIVE on UK Companies House (no. 12696083) since 24 June 2020, a longer run than most prop firms
- CEO publicly named (Lewis Mansbridge); acquired Funded Trading Plus in a seven-figure deal announced 26 May 2026
- Holds its own MT5 main-label licence, regained in Feb 2025 after the MetaQuotes gray-label crackdown, plus cTrader and Match-Trader
- Publishes real on-chain payout wallet addresses (Tron, Arbitrum, Ethereum); the Tron address shows 7,387 transactions, well above sector norms for transparency
- Fast payout cycle: first payout 14 days after first trade, then every 7 days, $25 minimum, stated 48-business-hour processing via RISE or USDC
- 80% base profit split with a 90% paid upgrade, at or above the sector standard
- The flagship “Smart Drawdown” is balance-based and non-trailing (10% of starting balance, fixing permanently at 5% once you are up 5%)
- Very large body of specific user reports describing repeated, frictionless payouts
Cons
- Two live contracts naming two different companies contradict each other on One-Phase max drawdown (8% vs 6%), Instant Funding profit split (80% vs 70%), and the number of account types
- The St Lucia counterparty, IF PRO LTD, is self-reported only and we could not confirm it on any registry, yet it is the counterparty on one of the two agreements
- Trustpilot has suppressed the firm's rating for “a breach of our guidelines”; 26% of 4,704 reviews are one-star
- Sole-discretion clauses: the firm may decide “at its own discretion” what is a Forbidden Trading Practice (7.10) and may “unilaterally change the fees and parameters of the Services at any time, including the parameters for their successful completion” (GTC 9.6)
- Tight per-product risk caps (1% to 3%), with a recurring complaint pattern of breaches being found only at the payout-review stage
- A trailing 6% drawdown is documented by the firm but never assigned to named products; no list prices outside checkout and refund terms unverifiable (help page 404s)
Verdict: Goat Funded Trader demonstrably pays traders, with $12.7M across 15,759 on-chain payouts, and its Step models offer a fair static drawdown at a competitive price. But the terms are worse than the marketing, the risk desk denies payouts on automated coordinated-trading flags with no external appeal, and the Trustpilot rating that would normally settle the argument has been suppressed for a guidelines breach. We score it 5.7 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Operating entity Wishes Tower International Limited, Hong Kong company no. 76428795, incorporated 11 April 2024, status Live (Wan Chai). CEO Edoardo Dalla Torre. Self-disclosed only: Goat Funded LTD (Saint Lucia, no. 2025-00240) and sister futures brand WITI LIMITED (HK 77146639). Founding year does not reconcile: the About page says “Established in 2022,” trade press dates the launch to May 2023, and the operating entity was only incorporated in April 2024 | Goat Funded Trader ↗ |
| Regulatory status | NOT regulated. Complaints Policy states verbatim: “Goat Funded Trader is not a regulated financial institution.” No FCA, ASIC, CFTC, NFA or CySEC licence, and no regulator warning names the firm. T&Cs: “The Company is not a financial broker, financial advisor, or financial representative, and does not accept client deposits.” All accounts are simulated: “The accounts utilized for our services are demo accounts” | Complaints Policy ↗ |
| Evaluation model | 1-Step, 2-Step (Standard and GOAT), 3-Step, Instant Funding (GOAT and PRO), Pay Later, Goat Blitz (weekend-only drops), and a $1 model. Profit targets: 1-Step 10%; 2-Step Standard 10% then 5%; 2-Step GOAT 8% then 6%; 3-Step 6% in each of three phases; Pay Later 4%. Minimum 3 valid trading days per phase, where a valid day means at least 0.5% profit. Instant is badged “Most Popular” | Goat Funded Trader ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | Sizes $5K–$400K. Fees captured live 12 Jul 2026 during a sitewide 40% promo (codes BOGO40 / FIRSTGFT), promo / list: 2-Step $100K $287/$478, $50K $185/$308, $25K $95/$158; 3-Step $100K $219/$365; 1-Step $100K $419/$698; Instant $100K $509/$848. Pay Later charges $5 up front and the real fee only on passing ($598 on $100K). The advertised “100% refundable fee” is a rebate paid only on your fourth payout; the Refund Policy itself states “There are no refunds on any Services purchased from the Company” | Goat Funded Trader ↗ |
| Max drawdown | Split by product, and this is the fact that matters most. Every Challenge/Step model is STATIC: 1-Step “6% (Static)”, 2-Step Standard “10% (Static)”, 2-Step GOAT “your account equity or balance must never drop below 90% of your starting capital”, 3-Step “8% (Static)”. Every Instant / Pay Later / Blitz model is TRAILING: Instant GOAT trails at 6% of equity, Instant PRO at 4% with no daily limit at all, Pay Later 8% (eval) / 6% (funded), Blitz 5%. Instant accounts also carry a kill switch: “If your floating profit and loss (PnL) drops below -2% of your account balance at any moment, the account will be permanently closed” | Goat Funded Trader ↗ |
| Profit split & payouts | 80% default on every model; 100% only as a paid add-on at checkout. The first on-demand reward requires “a minimum of 3% profit” and is paid at a reduced “40% profit split for that specific reward.” Rewards bi-weekly (14 days) thereafter, 3 trading days per cycle. Minimum withdrawal $100, processed “within 2 business days,” paid via Rise, Crypto and Skrill. First two rewards capped at 6% of initial balance or $10k. $3,000/day profit cap on funded accounts. Advertised guarantee: paid in 2 business days (24h on-demand) or GFT pays an extra $1,000 | Goat Funded Trader ↗ |
| Platform & products | MT5, TradeLocker, Match-Trader, cTrader, Volumetrica. Forex, stocks, ETFs, crypto. Leverage up to 1:100. US clients accepted but restricted to TradeLocker, Match-Trader or Volumetrica (no MT5). Underlying broker and liquidity provider are NOT disclosed anywhere in the terms. Platform history is turbulent: caught in the Feb 2024 MetaQuotes prop crackdown, MT4 reintroduced Jun 2024, TradeLocker added 17 Jul 2024, MT4 withdrawn again 18 Jul 2024 citing “multiple outages of Platform4,” own broker entity and MT5 licence announced 28 Apr 2025 | Finance Magnates ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
| Platform | Score | Sample | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot | Rating SUPPRESSED — “This company's rating is unavailable due to a breach of our guidelines” | 4,218 reviews; 50% five-star, 35% one-star (observed live 12 Jul 2026) | Source ↗ |
| TheTrustedProp (on-chain payout tracker) | $12,704,509.70 paid | 15,759 payouts, most recent 20 Jun 2026 | Source ↗ |
| Apple App Store (Goat Funded (GFT) iOS app) | 4.8 / 5 | 656 ratings — measures dashboard UX, not payout reliability | Source ↗ |
| Aggregate | No rating | Trustpilot rating suppressed for a guidelines breach; 4,218 reviews still visible (12 Jul 2026) | Normalized by TheFXGeek |
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“The Company is not a financial broker, financial advisor, or financial representative, and does not accept client deposits. ... The accounts utilized for our services are demo accounts.”
Goat Funded Trader Terms of Service, Goat Funded Trader Terms & Conditions, accessed July 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:$287 one-time (promo), rebated only on your 4th payout
$287 promo / $478 list for the $100K 2-Step. The advertised “100% refundable” fee is a rebate paid when you receive your fourth payout; the Refund Policy states “There are no refunds on any Services purchased from the Company.”Based on the the $100K 2-Step Challenge at Goat Funded Trader pricing ↗, accessed July 2026. Promotional pricing observed live 12 July 2026 under sitewide 40% codes (BOGO40 / FIRSTGFT). The fee is non-refundable if you fail before a fourth payout, so treat it as spent money..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“I recently received my first payout from GOAT Funded... I can confirm that I received my first payout without any issues. There are many negative reviews online, but in my case, GOAT honored their agreement and paid me as expected. That deserves to be acknowledged. Overall, I think GOAT Funded is a transparent prop firm. My only suggestion would be to reconsider the combination of the consistency rule and the daily profit requirement, and to make the conditions of promotional funded accounts clearer.”
Trustpilot reviewer, Trustpilot, 6 Jul 2026 source ↗
“Goat Funded Trader just breached my account (414316679) and denied my profit split payout of $2,041.02 based on an automated “coordinated group trading” flag. I want to state clearly that I trade 100% independently from my mobile phone. I do not use EAs, trade copiers, or signal groups... Punishing a discretionary trader because their timestamps coincidently align with the market mass defeats the entire purpose of technical analysis... If you use standard retail technical analysis, avoid this firm.”
Trustpilot reviewer (“$2,041 Payout Denied”), Trustpilot, 10 Jul 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Independently verified payouts: $12,704,509.70 across 15,759 on-chain transactions (TheTrustedProp, most recent 20 Jun 2026)
- Genuinely static maximum drawdown on every Challenge/Step model (1-Step 6%, 2-Step 10%, 3-Step 8%)
- Operating entity independently confirmed: Wishes Tower International Limited, HK no. 76428795, incorporated 11 Apr 2024
- CEO publicly named (Edoardo Dalla Torre), which many competitors do not do
- The 2-Step Standard carries no consistency rule at all
- Competitive pricing: $100K 2-Step at $287 and $100K 3-Step at $219 on promo (12 Jul 2026)
- Five platforms (MT5, TradeLocker, Match-Trader, cTrader, Volumetrica); US clients accepted on three
- Pay Later defers most of the fee until after you pass ($5 up front on every account size)
Cons
- Trustpilot has suppressed the firm's rating for a guidelines breach, while GFT advertises “4.8 Stars from 5k verified Reviews” on its own site the same day
- Recurring payout denials on an automated “coordinated trading” flag hitting traders who say they trade manually and alone, with appeals reportedly unanswered and no regulator to escalate to
- The “ONE-TIME 100% REFUNDABLE FEE” is contradicted by the firm's own Refund Policy; it is a rebate contingent on a fourth payout, not a refund
- The “Most Popular” badge sits on Instant Funding: trailing drawdown plus a -2% floating-PnL kill switch that permanently closes the account
- Fully discretionary breach clause for any “trading style that we deem too risky,” alongside a §8.1 disclaimer of any guarantee of monetary payment
- Self-reported payout totals ($23M homepage, $20M+ About page) contradict each other and roughly double the independently tracked figure
Verdict: Blue Guardian pays small and pays fast, and its closed-trade high-water-mark trailing drawdown is genuinely more forgiving than the intraday-equity trailing used elsewhere. But its own controlling documents contradict each other on who you contract with, whether your fee is refundable and what a late payout is worth, and the complaints cluster precisely where the money gets big. We score it 4.8 / 10.
SpecificationsAll values cited from public sources
| Attribute | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Firm & track record | Two firm-controlled terms documents name different counterparties. The checkout terms state the site “is operated by Iconic Exchange Limited trading as Blue Guardian,” “registered in England and Wales under company number 12087566,” with “the courts of England and Wales” holding exclusive jurisdiction. UK Companies House shows ICONIC EXCHANGE LIMITED as Dissolved by compulsory strike-off, Final Gazette 6 May 2025. Sole director on that record: BAINTON, Sean Finbar (British, DOB June 2003, resident UAE, appointed 5 July 2019). The main site's terms instead name Blue Guardian Limited (Saint Lucia), Iconic Exchange FZCO (Dubai) and Blue Guardian Marketing LLC (Dubai) under “the laws of the United Arab Emirates.” Year founded is not disclosed on the firm's own site | UK Companies House ↗ |
| Regulatory status | NOT regulated, by design, and the firm says so: “Blue Guardian is not a broker, does not take client deposits, does not hold or manage real client funds, and does not provide financial advisory services of any kind,” and “The Company is not a licensed investment services provider (securities broker-dealer) within the meaning of MIFID II.” All accounts are simulated: “All trading on the platform ... is only notional trading on a demo account.” No regulator (FCA, CFTC, ASIC, CySEC) has warned about or named Blue Guardian, and no lawsuit or class action is on record. This is sector-normal; the problem is not the missing licence, it is the dissolved counterparty | Blue Guardian Terms ↗ |
| Evaluation model | Eight live models: Instant Standard, Instant Starter, 1 Step Standard, 1 Step Pro, 1 Step Crypto, 2 Step Standard, 2 Step Pro, 3 Step. Instant models fund on purchase with no profit target; step models require a target first (1 Step 10%; 2 Step Standard 8% then 4%; 2 Step Pro 10% then 4%; 3 Step 6% in each of three phases). There is no time limit on any evaluation, but a day only counts toward the minimum-trading-day requirement if you make at least 0.5% profit on it | Blue Guardian Help Centre ↗ |
| Account sizes & fees | Sizes $5K–$400K. Blue Guardian prices by platform and model, not by account size alone, and only one rung is directly confirmed at source: the $100,000 “Trading Evaluation - MT5 Instant” at $778 list, taken to roughly $467 by a sitewide LAUNCH 40% coupon that is genuinely live. We do not publish a full ladder because one is not verifiable. The headline $10 Instant Starter price is real (the coupon produces it) and there is no hidden markup, but it caps maximum profit at $250, allows “One payout only,” and then closes: “Once a payout is processed, the account will be permanently closed” | Blue Guardian ↗ |
| Max drawdown | Not one rule but eight, and this is the fact that matters most. FIVE models TRAIL: Instant Standard 6%, Instant Starter 5%, 1 Step Standard 6%, 1 Step Crypto 6%, 2 Step Pro 10%. THREE are STATIC, labelled in the firm's own articles as “Maximum Overall Drawdown (Static)”: 1 Step Pro 6%, 2 Step Standard 8%, 3 Step 8%. Crucially the trailing variant tracks a CLOSED-TRADE high-water mark, not intraday equity: “6% trailing of your Highest Watermark Closing Trade made.” It also locks: “If your account reaches 6% of your Initial balance your trailing Drawdown will lock in at your starting balance,” after which “a fixed 1% buffer” is added. Daily loss is 3% of initial balance (Instant Standard, Instant Starter, 1 Step Pro) or 4% (all other models), resetting at 5pm EST | Blue Guardian Help Centre ↗ |
| Profit split & payouts | 80% Instant Standard, 85% challenge-funded, 90% Instant Starter or via a paid add-on. First payout 14 calendar days after the first trade (7 with a paid add-on), then every 14 days. Minimum $100 via crypto or $500 via Rise. “Payouts are processed within 24 business hours.” “All payouts are subject to a 2% processing fee.” Instant Standard accounts of $200k and above have their first two payouts capped at $10,000 each. Late-payout compensation is promised twice, incompatibly: the homepage says “Funds in 24 hours, or we pay 100% of the profits. Guaranteed,” while the help centre says “you will automatically receive $1,000 in compensation.” Scaling is by merging accounts up to $400K total | Blue Guardian Help Centre ↗ |
| Platform & products | MT5, TradeLocker, Match-Trader, NinjaTrader, Tradovate, DeepCharts and TradingView. Maximum leverage 1:30. The firm claims its own MT5 licence and server (blog, 4 May 2025). The underlying broker and liquidity provider are NOT disclosed and have not been named since Eightcap withdrew prop-firm brokerage in February 2024; the ASIC-licensed broker Blue Guardian announced it was acquiring in late February 2024 has never been identified and no AFSL has been confirmed. The restricted-countries article 404s on the firm's own site, and spreads, commissions, instrument counts and max lot size are not published | Blue Guardian ↗ |
| Guardian Shield | The firm's signature risk mechanic, and its most-complained-about rule. It auto-closes ALL open trades when floating loss reaches 1% (Instant accounts) or 2% (all other accounts). The first activation is a soft breach that permanently cuts the profit split to 50%; a second activation closes the account. The firm describes the cut as going “from 80% to 50%,” which does not map cleanly onto its own 85% and 90% accounts, so a trader on an 85% split cannot tell from the documentation what they would actually drop to. This is not an allegation: it is the firm's own published design | Blue Guardian Help Centre ↗ |
Third-Party Review ScoresAggregated from external sources
| Platform | Score | Sample | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ForexPeaceArmy | 1.0 / 5 | 6 reviews, all complaints, dated Jul 2025 to May 2026 | Source ↗ |
| Trustpilot (separate blueguardianfutures.com profile) | 3.9 / 5 | 999 reviews; 63% five-star, 21% one-star. Futures-domain profile, claimed Nov 2024. The main blueguardian.com profile displays no TrustScore | Source ↗ |
| PropFirmMatch | 4 “Yes Payout” vs 6 “No Payout” | 10 tagged reviews; payouts received cluster Mar 2026, denials May–Jul 2026 | Source ↗ |
| Aggregate | No rating | Main Trustpilot profile shows no TrustScore; Trustpilot notes a guidelines breach and fake-review removal (12 Jul 2026) | Normalized by TheFXGeek |
Regulation & Risk: Terms QuoteVerbatim from the client agreement
“The Company reserves the sole and absolute discretion to determine any breach and may, without prior notice, take action including account suspension or termination, trade voiding, profit/loss adjustments, payout denial.”
Blue Guardian Terms of Service, Blue Guardian Terms & Conditions, breach and enforcement, accessed July 2026 TOS ↗
Trading CostOne-time evaluation fee for a funded account
Cost to get funded:From ~$467 one-time (assume non-refundable)
$778 list for the $100K MT5 Instant evaluation, roughly $467 with the live sitewide LAUNCH 40% coupon. Refund status is contradicted across three firm documents (main policy says all sales final; checkout says refunded with your first payout; the blog says after the 4th payout and never on Instant Starter), so we treat the fee as non-refundable.Based on the the $100K MT5 Instant evaluation at Blue Guardian pricing ↗, accessed July 2026. Only confirmed price rung. Fees vary by platform and model, not by account size alone. All payouts carry a 2% processing fee..
Community SentimentOne representative positive, one critical
“My Experience with Blueguardian Is Awesome Took First Payout 205$ From 5k Instant Starter account that i bought it with 10$ only.. Thank you Blueguardian..”
Surajit (IN), 5.0 stars, tagged “Yes Payout”, PropFirmMatch, 12 Mar 2026 source ↗
“It was all fine and good until the time of payout came(1300$). The behaviour of customer care changed, they flagged a violation on my account and blocked me out of my login, discord community etc. This itself is a proof that something is gravely wrong in the way the firm works.”
Brijesh (IN), 1.0 star, tagged “No Payout”, PropFirmMatch, 19 Jun 2026 source ↗
Pros
- Trailing drawdown tracks a closed-trade high-water mark, not intraday equity (“6% trailing of your Highest Watermark Closing Trade made”), which is materially more forgiving than the intraday trailing used by several rivals
- The trailing drawdown locks: once the account reaches 6% above the initial balance it fixes at the starting balance, with “a fixed 1% buffer” added on top
- Three of the eight models (1 Step Pro, 2 Step Standard, 3 Step) use a genuinely static drawdown, labelled as such in the firm's own help centre
- No time limit on any evaluation, so there is no artificial pressure to overtrade
- EAs are allowed, and overnight and weekend holding are both permitted
- Small payouts are repeatedly confirmed as landing fast, with a $100 crypto minimum and a documented 24-business-hour processing target
- Wide platform range: MT5, TradeLocker, Match-Trader, NinjaTrader, Tradovate, DeepCharts and TradingView
- Survived the February 2024 MetaQuotes and Eightcap shakeout that ended a large number of its peers, and has continued operating and paying since
Cons
- The checkout terms name a dissolved company: “Iconic Exchange Limited ... registered in England and Wales under company number 12087566,” which Companies House shows as Dissolved by compulsory strike-off, Final Gazette 6 May 2025
- The main site's terms name three entirely different UAE and Saint Lucia entities under UAE law, so the two documents disagree on both counterparty and jurisdiction
- Three incompatible refund policies: main policy says “All sales are final,” checkout promises a refund “with your first successful profit split payment,” the blog says only after the 4th payout and never on Instant Starter
- Denied-payout complaints cluster at the large first payout, with compliance allegations and no trade-level evidence supplied; PropFirmMatch tags 6 of 10 reviews “No Payout” and ForexPeaceArmy sits at 1/5
- Main Trustpilot rating is suppressed: the profile shows no TrustScore, with Trustpilot noting a guidelines breach and the removal of fake reviews
- Payout totals are self-reported only: the “$20 million” figure comes from a paid press release the carrying site itself disclaims, while the firm's blog says $21M
- Guardian Shield permanently cuts the profit split on first activation and closes the account on second, described as a cut “from 80% to 50%” that does not map onto the firm's own 85% and 90% accounts
- The executing broker has not been named since February 2024, and the promised ASIC-licensed broker acquisition has never been identified
Frequently asked questions
There is no single best prop firm — it depends on whether you trade forex/CFDs or futures, how forgiving you need the drawdown to be, and how much the fee and split matter to you. The rankings above score each firm on evaluation rules, drawdown design, fees, and verifiable payout track record so you can match one to your style.
Reputable firms do, but proof varies. Most advertise self-reported payout totals that no outside party has audited. The strongest signal is independent evidence — on-chain payout trails, large verifiable review bases, or third-party payout trackers. We flag which firms have genuinely independent payout proof versus those relying only on their own marketing numbers.
Most proprietary trading firms are not regulated as brokers, because you are trading the firm's simulated or funded capital under a contract rather than depositing your own money with a broker. That makes the firm's rule transparency and payout track record especially important to verify.
You typically pay a one-time evaluation fee and trade to a profit target while staying within daily and maximum drawdown limits. Pass, and you receive a funded account with an agreed profit split. Rules vary by firm — read them carefully before paying.
A static (or end-of-day) drawdown sets a fixed loss floor that only moves up as your balance grows, which is far more forgiving. An intraday trailing drawdown follows your highest unrealised profit during a trade, so giving back open profit can fail your account even on a winning day. Drawdown design is one of the biggest differences between a fair test and a trap.
Not inherently — the legitimate model sells a paid skill test with a real payout pipeline. The risk is in the details: non-refundable fees, discretion-heavy rules that allow terminations near payout, and firms with no verifiable payout history. The 2024–25 wave of MetaTrader-prop closures shows the model's fragility, so favour firms with long track records and independent payout proof.
Our top pick
FundingPips, score 7.4/10
FundingPips pairs one of the few independently on-chain-verified payout records in the sector with a strict, discretion-heavy rule book and no regulatory protection. Open a demo to try it risk-free, then fund a live account when you're ready. Trading carries risk.
Try FundingPips
