The 5%ers are an experienced and trusted prop firm which has been funding traders for over 5 years. They have excellent industry knowledge and have now branched out and started a new brand – Trade the Pool.
Trade the pool offers traders access to nearly the entire stock market which is extremely rare in the prop trading world. In this review we will look at what this prop firm offers in detail and work out if its as good as it looks.
The funding model - Overview
Trade the Pool is operating a single phase challenge model to receive funding. The main selling point of this program is that they offer unlimited buying power! Therefore traders are only limited by their daily/overall loss limits. Lets take a look at some of the challenge parameters:
Super Buying Power ($240)
- Daily Loss Limit: $700
- Profit Target: $4200 (6 times DD)
- Max Overall Drawdown: $2100 (3 times DD)
- Payout Split: 50/50
- Minimum Trades: 50
- Time Limit: 1 Month
Extra Buying Power ($415)
- Daily Loss Limit: $1300
- Profit Target: $7800 (6 times DD)
- Max Overall Drawdown: $3900 (3 times DD)
- Payout Split: 55/45
- Minimum Trades: 50
- Time Limit: 1 Month
Ultimate Buying Power ($1180)
- Daily Loss Limit: $2000
- Profit Target: $12000 (6 times DD)
- Max Overall Drawdown: $6000 (3 times DD)
- Payout Split: 65/35
- Minimum Trades: 50
- Time Limit: 1 Month
This firm also has an alternate way of scaling. Since buying power is already limited, you can scale your max daily loss instead. We will look at this in more detail below.
Trade the Pool's Pump and Dump scaling
Pump
As mentioned, you have unlimited buying power when trading. Therefore traders are only limited by their loss limits. If you can prove you can manage the risk while making profits, Trade the Pool will increase your loss limits each time certain conditions are met. These conditions are:
- 5 Consecutive winning days
- Total profit over the 5 days must be over 3 times your daily loss.
For example: if your daily loss is $700, you must make at least $2100 over 5 days, while ending each day in profit.
Dump
The dump is the operasite of the pump. It can only be implemented if you have already received a pump. Therefor your daily loss will not fall below your inital level. The dump will occure when:
- 5 Consectutive losing days
- Total loss over the 5 days exceeds 2 times your daily loss
For example: if your daily loss is $700 and you make a loss of $1450, while ending everyday in a loss, your daily loss limit will be decreased.
Pump/Dump Rates:
The amount your account’s daily loss limit will increase or decrease depends on the type of account you bought.
- Super Buying Power ($240) – 5%
- Extra Buying Power ($415) – 8%
- Ultimate Buying Power ($1180) – 15%
Trade the Pool's Rules
As this is a totally differant prop trading experience, you can expect slightly differant rules than you may be used to. We’ve looked through the website and the fine print and will outline all the rules that you need to know below.
Profit Target/ Completing the challenge
To complete the challenge phase and become funded you must complete both the required profit target as well as the minimum trades.
Your profit target is 6 times your daily loss limit. For example, if your loss limit is $700, to get funded you must reach $4200 in profit.
The minimum trade requirement is a flat 50 for all accounts.
Risk Management
The maximum amount of allowed risk per trade is 30% of your daily loss limit. This would imply that a stop loss is required for all trades, however this is not mentioned on their website.
Drawdowns
The initial daily drawdown allowance depends on the choice of program. It starts at $700, $1300, $2000.
The max drawdown is simply 3 times this amount, $2100, $3900, $6000.
As mentioned previously this can be increased/decreased depending on performance.
When can I trade?
You may only trade while the US stock market is open. Therefore you can begin trading at 9.30 ET and must be finished by 15.55 ET (5 minutes before close).
Holding trades
With this prop firm all trades must be closed by the end of the day (15.55 ET). This therefore only allows for day traders.
Trading Instruments
You can trade almost any stock and ETF in the US markets. There are over 3000 instruments available. The entire list can be found on the website.
Other things to know
Start over button
If you reach your daily loss for the day, but want to continue trading you can pay a fee to reset your daily loss allowance and continue trading.
Redemption fee
If at the end of the 4 weeks you havn’t hit the profit target/min trades, you can pay a redemption fee and continue trading for longer.
Ruby – Trading edge
Traders will have access to a program called Ruby, which will notify the second any important or newsworthy event happens. Traders can use this to make quick fire decisions on the future of a stock.
PropTrading.online Verdict
This is certainly an interesting proposal by a very well regarded prop firm. The unique style of this is typical from the 5%ers who like to push the boat out and bring traders new and exciting experiences.
On the surface this looks to be a great opportunity for those who are more experienced trading with stocks as opposed to forex/commodities/indexes which are the normal instruments most prop firms are limited to.
The unlimited buying power is an interesting concept, however while coupled with restricting loss limits it does seem more of a gimmick or possibly a method to trick less experienced traders to overleveraging. For the experienced trader however it does open some doors and provides some great opportunities for earnings.
We would like to see some more information provided on the website as alot of important information and rules appear to be missing, or are not available until after a purchase. Information that we couldn’t find include:
- Stop Loss rules
- Rules around bots/automatic trading
- Copy trading rules
- Payout times or methods
- Any rules around consistency
- Full list of terms and conditions
With that said, we are happy to recommend this prop firm due to their reputation, but advise proceeding with caution due to lack of information on their website.
Visit Trade the Pool
To visit Trade the Pool, click on the image below and hit the “Trade the Pool” option. Alternatively click the button below.
