Qualification
The $50,000 Assessment is the firm's only public entry point. Anyone may attempt it. Completing it is not a formality — it is how a professional record begins.
What is expected
The specifications below define the boundaries. They do not define what it takes to trade well within them. Traders who complete this Assessment and go on to progress within the firm tend to share the same characteristics, and none of them are about being right more often.
If that describes how you already trade, the specifications below will read as reasonable. If it does not, they will read as obstacles.
Specification
Positions may be opened at any point within the Globex trading window. Regular trading hours are shown for reference only — that is where liquidity concentrates, not a restriction on when you may trade. All positions are closed automatically at 1555 CST each weekday and cannot be held overnight or over a weekend.
The assessment fee differs by platform because the licensing cost of each differs. The account is identical in every other respect — same $50,000, same growth target, same trailing loss, same consistency requirement, same contract limits. You are choosing an execution environment, not a tier.
On news: a position opened before a scheduled high-impact release may be carried through it, and pre-defined stops triggering inside the restricted window are not a violation. What is not permitted is opening a new position within three minutes either side of the release. The rule exists to prevent binary bets on the print, not to keep you out of the market around it.
In practice
The loss threshold sits $1,500 below your account's high point. As the account grows on a closing basis, the threshold follows it upward. It never moves back down.
Once it reaches your starting balance, it locks there permanently and stops trailing.
Your best single trading day must account for no more than one third of your total gains. It is measured as best day divided by total.
It is not a breach rule. But it must be satisfied before you can qualify, or later request a payout.
Gains are withdrawable from the funded account. The first request has no waiting period; after that, once every 30 days, and no more than half your accumulated gains in any single period.
Requesting a payout permanently locks the trailing loss at your starting balance. From that point the account can never fall below where it began.
Once funded, 3% of the account must remain in it and cannot be withdrawn. It is not a fee and is not deducted — it simply stays, keeping a cushion above the trailing loss.
Only gains above the buffer are withdrawable, and the 80/20 split applies to that amount.
Before you apply
These are the conditions traders most often find out about after paying elsewhere. None of them are unusual. All of them are worth knowing first.
After qualification
Capital Access
The specifications above are the whole of it. There is nothing further disclosed after payment.
$149 – $201 · One-time assessment fee by platform · No subscription