Trader Talent Funded Prop Trader Programme
Frequently Asked Questions
Note: For questions about our futures trading platform’s functionality and how to get started with it – please refer to the separate Trader Talent Pro FAQ.
Simply register here and a 2-week demo account will be issued to you instantly (no credit card required).
Watch the video below to see how you can be up and trading for free within just a few minutes:
Trader Talent offers aspiring traders such as yourself the opportunity to prove your trading talent in the futures markets. To do this you will need to trade within set risk parameters and trade your profit towards a target amount. This is done on a Tryout which is a real time data, simulated environment, paid monthly subscription challenge, where you prove you have the skill and discipline to trade the futures markets as they fluctuate right now, profitably and consistently.
If you succeed, Trader Talent then organises with partner prop trading firms to back your trading on the same rules but with a live account. You avoid any downside risk and take home nearly all the profits. Watch the walk through on the front page and read more about opportunities with the Growth, Venture and Rocket account options.
Trader Talent Pro which has its own FAQ here.
Trader Talent Pro is TraderTalent.com’s custom platform built over the CQG network by a dedicated partner firm in Chicago. The underlying infrastructure has been tried and tested for many years and was chosen by Trader Talent for its ability to quickly recover from issues that you might experience on your own network, wherever in the world you may be. We have both an in-browser and a downloadable version which is preferred by multi-screen setup users.
It’s easily one of the top 5 futures trading platforms out there, complete with quotes and charts, one-click ladder execution and features like market profile and a full performance analysis centre.
The founders of Trader Talent began prop trading for a living on electronic futures platforms back in 2002. Since then they have participated in feature development and testing for major ISVs and traded from some very remote places. We are confident Trader Talent Pro has what it takes for you to achieve your goals and we are excited to be able to offer it to you free of charge.
Register on TraderTalent.com for your Trader Talent Pro 2-week free trial with live data, and squawk – no credit card required.
You may trade over economic releases during your Tryout. However, once live there is a restricted list of events and releases you must not have position on for, and for the purpose of best practice you should really trade the Tryout under the same conditions as the live account.
It is advisable to trade with caution over any economic release as they can be quite volatile and it could cause your account to infringe the Tryout rules. You as the trader are responsible for knowing when announcements are due to be released and their likely potential to impact the market on that occasion.
A great way of keeping up to date with economic releases in real time is to use an audio news squak such as LiveSquawk. You get 2 weeks of Livesquawk included in the free trial. After which you can purchase it here.
Another great analysis tool used on professional prop trading floors is a Bloomberg or Eikon terminal but they can be prohibitively expensive for retail traders. But fortunately Metastock offer Xenith which is almost identical. We have negotiated with them to get you a Xenith 3 months for 1 deal. Check it out!
You are not allowed to hold overnight positions in either the Tryout or live account stages. All accounts will need to be flat between 3.10pm and 5pm CT. If you have not flattened your book at this stage or attempt to add a position you will be automatically liquidated and this will constitute a rule break.
There is a big red button “Exit All Positions Cancel All’ under the Equity tab dropdown in TraderTalentPro, we strongly recommend you click this once you are done for the day.
A selection of futures contracts on CME are available to trade on the Tryouts which replicate what the backing firms are happy to have you live on. We may vary the tradeable products for the Tryouts list from time to time but there will always be a varied choice.
You will need to use your own intraday futures trading strategy. Trader Talent does not provide trading signals, it is set up for point and click manual day traders to prove their talent.
While we may have some articles on techniques to help refine your trading, so long as your trades would be valid, repeatable and acceptable on a live exchange it is really up to you.
If you are looking to get started in futures trading check out our partner offers on education.
Except for the purchase of exchange data (starting at $3 a month) which is charged by the exchanges and the payment processed via a third party inside TraderTalentPro, there are no additional charges. (Trader Talent does not benefit from exchange data payments in any way. For more info on how to buy exchange data see the TraderTalentPro FAQ)
However, if you break a rule then you exit the assessment, so you have the option to buy a reset product in order to start afresh and resume being assessed for a live account.
While not billed to you, the costs of doing each trade on a per contract/lot basis are netted against your Tryout balance. These represent the same fees that you would be charged once live and relate to non-member exchange fees, NFA/regulatory fees (where applicable), commission and clearing fees/charges from the FCM.
Your overall Tryout balance never resets automatically. It carries across calendar months and your 30 day subscription cycle. It can only be reset by purchasing the reset product. Your daily profit and loss record will refresh daily in the Trader Talent Pro platform but this does not affect your overall running totals.
There is no time-limit required to achieve your target once the minimum number of days have been traded.
Charges affecting your Tryout balance relate to the costs of executing the trades as if you were live. These include non-member rate exchange fees, regulatory/NFA equivalent fees, commission, clearing fees and FCM charges.
Your chosen Tryout subscription is charged on a rolling, recurring 30 day basis from the date of initial purchase. It can be cancelled at any time within your account section of tradertalent.com There are no pro-rated refunds, cancellation simply prevents any future subscription payment from being taken on the next due date.
Your data subscription is separate and overseen by a third party. That too can be cancelled at any time from within the Trader Talent Pro futures trading software.
When you break a rule in the Tryout your trading and assessment for a live account is suspended. In order to enable trading and be assessed for a live account once more you are required to buy the reset product. This can work in two important ways:
- If this is the first time you have broken a rule and your overall net account balance is higher than the initial starting balance for the Tryout, purchasing a reset will restart your Tryout with the higher balance that was left after the automated liquidation of your positions that day.
- If you have a lower balance than the initial balance of the Tryout or this is not the first time you have broken a rule, then purchasing a reset will simply restart your Tryout at the standard initial balance for the chosen Tryout.
Once your reset has been purchased it will issue you a new sub account which you will find in the account dropdown at the top of Trader Talent Pro. It is your responsibility to check you are trading on the newest/correct account for assessment. This is explained further in the Trader Talent Pro FAQ section.
Yes. These are processed as a separate payment within the Trader Talent Pro trading platform by a third party. See “how do I buy exchange data” in the Trader Talent Pro FAQ.
We used to add this cost into the Tryouts and order it for you but customers wanted lower Tryout costs and greater control over data fees. So now you get full control – don’t need Comex? – don’t need full depth of book? then don’t buy it. It’s all in your hands now starting from about $3 required to get trading.
Trader Talent operates its trading platform Trader Talent Pro on a buying power model rather than offering you a fixed number of lots. So long as you do not place trades that result in exceeding your futures margin allowance, you can trade as many of the permitted products as you wish.
However, rather than being a ‘jack of all trades and master of none’ we would suggest you dedicate your time and research to one particular product, find your edge and master it.
There are trailing stops on live accounts but not on the Tryouts which have Mon-Fri weekly stops instead. The overall trailing draw-down stop on live accounts no longer rises behind your increasing account balance once it has reached the initial starting balance of your live account. Please see the charts on the Growth, Venture and Rocket tryout pages for a better visual demonstration.
Yes. However if you decide to do this you must make sure you do not accidentally go over the maximum amount of 100% initial margin, as that would constitute a rule break and you will be auto-liquidated and need to buy a reset. You must keep and eye on your margin usage indicator in the top right of the Trader Talent Pro platform.
If this happens you will be automatically liquidated and will need to purchase a reset to be eligible for assessment to trade a fresh Tryout account again. However, you may still practice on the market replay facility which includes five days of rolling data until you decide to purchase a reset or your subscription expires.
Please see the rules for each respective Tryout, Growth, Venture and Rocket.
Only a maximum amount of profit will count towards your overall target in any one trading day. This helps ensure that any ‘elephant winners’ do not distort the consistency our backing partners require to be seen in the Tryouts. Of course once you are live then your real profit is real profit, the bigger the better.
When you break a rule your permission to trade that particular account gets revoked. When you purchase a reset you are issued a new account. If you decide not to purchase a reset and wish to practice your trading some more before undertaking another assessment, so long as your data subscription is active you can trade on the market replay function in Trader Talent Pro which always has the 5 days of rolling data available to practice on.
Depending on how you are managing your exchange data expiry you might also be able to trade on your original free trial account.
Questions about billing
We only accept online payment methods available in your region as seen at checkout which permit recurring subscription charges.
This a rolling monthly subscription cycle from the day you began, rather than calendar month charge.
You will need to enter your payment details into the Trader Talent Pro trading platform, in the top right under application settings you will find everything you need to purchase exchange data.
Payments are taken via a third party and passed to the exchange. Trader Talent gets no money from this they are passthrough costs. You will be able to pick and choose which data feeds you wish to subscribe to.
Once live you will need to pay professional data rates rather than discounted retail rates available to non pro traders. This is an exchange rule when trading third party funds.
We don’t offer refunds as a general rule as purchases immediately create pass through charges to us which are unrecoverable. For technical billing errors we will examine each case individually.
Almost instantly, you will be issued a new sub account in the Trader Talent Pro drop-down to trade from under fresh assessment.
Please contact us about this we will see what we can organise but bear in mind your data is billed per calendar month by the exchange and they will not pro rate it for you.
Unfortunately not, this is out of our hands, the exchanges bill per calendar month for the full month. We would not advise you to start live (in particular) in the last week of the month for this reason as you will still be paying full price for the data for that whole month and again on the first day of the following month.
The data fee transactions are administered by a third party on behalf of the exchanges. There may be slightly higher costs of a few dollars related to third party charges/card fees compared to what the exchanges publish. This is currently out of our hands, it does not benefit Trader Talent financially as we are not involved in those transactions.
Questions about live backed accounts
You will need a current utility bill dated within the last three months and a form of identification. Passport or national ID card.
Yes. But it is your responsibility to stay within the parameters of your account. If you use all your margin and that trade goes against you, you may be auto liquidated out of that trade due to insufficient funds and you will be back to the Tryouts.
You can trade over most economic releases. The economic releases you are not permitted to trade are listed here.
No. Overnight positions are not permitted. Rare exceptions might be made depending on the profit level of your account but this would be decided on a case by case basis.
No. This is not possible. You would need to repeat the Tryout stage and qualify for a live account again.
Our Trader Talent Pro platform has built in functionality which can detect when you are approaching a breach of the parameters of your chosen account. If this occurs gradually, depending on the scenario, Trader Talent Pro may issue a warning, then permit exit trades only and finally liquidate the positions at market. It might be the case that all these events seem to happen at once when all triggers are set off together by your actions.
If you break the rules on your backed account, you will be disabled and given the option to go back to the Tryout stage of the process.
If you have profits on account these will be paid out according to your stage of the profit split in accordance with minimums required for a withdrawal.
Trading over certain economic releases is not permitted and the weekly stop is removed and replaced by a trailing stop. For further details and other differences please see the base of the Growth, Venture and Rocket descriptions.
It is not possible to execute trades which by placing them would exceed your margin allowance on live accounts. However, it should be noted that if you enter a large position (near maximum margin) and the market goes against you, this will result in a margin call almost immediately and your positions will be liquidated. We advise people to trade well within the confines of their account and trade size that they are comfortable with that is prudent for their strategy.
The stops are extreme backups and traders should engage money management techniques of their own well before these levels.
You are provided with margin exposure in your trading account via the back end but your sub account statement will begin at zero. This makes it easier to see how you are performing and clearer as to what is available as profit for you to withdraw.