Rules as published by each firm
CFD vs FUTURES
Static Equity-Based vs End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing
☪ Islamic / Swap-Free Ready
FTMO vs TradeDay
Which of these two is likelier to end your account, and why — compared rule by rule from what each firm publishes.
Short answer
- The drawdown works differently, and that is the difference that matters. FTMO's loss limit is fixed to your starting balance and never moves; TradeDay's steps up at each daily close and never steps back down. TradeDay: A floor set at last night's close is still enforced live all session, so you can be liquidated intraday by a level you never saw move.
- Daily loss cap: FTMO 5%, TradeDay 2.5%.
- Minimum trading days: FTMO 4 days, TradeDay 5 days — this sets the earliest you can finish, however fast you hit the target.
- Overnight and weekend: FTMO lets you hold; TradeDay requires you flat before the session closes, so a swing plan does not fit it.
- Entry cost: TradeDay from $99, FTMO from $155.
Figures below are what each firm publishes. Confirm them on the firm's own site before paying for an evaluation — these rules change without notice.
FTMO
CFD • Max $2,000,000
Drawdown Model
Static Equity-Based
Profit Split
80% - 90%
Starting Price
$155
Min Trading Days
4 Days
TradeDay
FUTURES • Max $250,000
Drawdown Model
End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing
Profit Split
90% - 100%
Starting Price
$99
Min Trading Days
5 Days
Side-by-Side Specifications Matrix
Every figure below is taken from the firm's own published rules. Check the source and date under the table before you size a position on it — prop firm rules change without notice.
| Evaluation Parameter | FTMO | TradeDay |
|---|---|---|
| Asset Class / Market | CFD | FUTURES |
| Drawdown Calculation Type | Static Equity-Based Measured on equity — balance plus open trade P/L, swaps and commissions — so an open losing position can breach the limit before you ever close it. On the 2-Step the loss limit is fixed for the life of the account and never moves; FTMO's other programme uses a limit that trails your end-of-day balance upward at 00:00 CE(S)T and never moves back down. |
End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing |
| Max Daily Loss | 5.0% 5% of your starting capital on the 2-Step, measured on equity, with the limit reset at 00:00 CE(S)T; FTMO's other programme uses a different percentage that we could not independently confirm. |
2.5% Left unchanged under the refuted-verdict rule — see left_uncorrected; the only loss-based failure condition TradeDay publishes is the Maximum Drawdown. |
| Max Overall Loss | 10.0% 10% of your starting capital, measured on equity, and the same figure on both of FTMO's programmes. |
3% 3% is the $100k trailing max drawdown ($97,000 floor); the $25k and $50k accounts are 4% ($1,000 / $2,000) and the $150k is 3% ($4,500), identical across Quick Pay and Fast Pass. |
| Profit Split | 80% - 90% | 90% - 100% |
| Minimum Trading Days | 4 Days 4 trading days on each phase of the 2-Step Challenge and Verification; whether it applies on FTMO's other programmes was not independently confirmed. |
5 Days 5 is the Quick Pay figure; TradeDay's own pages contradict each other on Fast Pass (its knowledge base says 3, its marketing pages say none), so this was left unchanged. |
| News Trading Policy | ✓ On a funded Standard account you cannot open or close a trade within 2 minutes before or after selected news releases; Swing accounts are exempt, and the restriction does not apply during the Challenge or Verification for either account type | ✓ TradeDay auto-liquidates every open position 2 minutes before and reopens 2 minutes after its Tier-1 releases (FOMC, CPI, non-farm payrolls, crude oil and natural gas inventories, crop production); accidental breaches are forgiven, repeated abuse loses the account |
| Weekend & Overnight Holding | ✓ Permitted (Swing accounts may hold over the weekend at any stage; Standard accounts are unrestricted during the Challenge and Verification but must be flat before the weekend close once funded) | ✗ Flat by Close (Overnight and multi-session holding is allowed — a position opened in one session must be closed before the next session's close, and all positions are auto-liquidated 10 minutes before each daily close) |
| Supported Platforms | MT4, MT5, cTrader, TradingView | Tradovate, NinjaTrader, TradingView |
| Payout Schedule | Bi-weekly (Every 14 days) or on-demand Payouts are on demand from the 14-day mark onward, not a forced fortnightly cycle. |
On request with no buffer and no minimum trading period on Quick Pay; requests submitted before 5:30pm ET are processed the next business day, minimum $250 Cut-off is 5:30pm ET for next-business-day processing; the repo's earlier 'same-day once the safety buffer is met' matched nothing on TradeDay's own pages. |
| First Payout Eligibility | 14 days from first placed trade You can claim on the 14th day after your first placed trade or any day after it, with roughly 1-2 business days to review and 1-2 more to pay. |
Quick Pay: none — withdraw from any positive balance; Fast Pass: 5 profitable trading days, each clearing a per-tier minimum profit ($100/$150/$200/$250 for $25k/$50k/$100k/$150k) The 5 Fast Pass days need not be consecutive, and the balance must also be above the starting balance with net profit since the last payout. |
| Consistency Rule | No restrictive consistency rule True for the 2-Step; FTMO's newer programme carries a different rule that our checker could not confirm, so do not read this as covering every FTMO account. |
Evaluation only: no single day may exceed 30% of total profit to date on Quick Pay (45% on Fast Pass); a breach raises the profit target instead of failing the account, and no consistency rule applies to Funded Sim or Funded Live Measured as one day's P&L against total profit to date; separately, Fast Pass Funded Sim accounts opened on or after 26 July 2026 must also pass a 45% single-day check before a payout is released. |
| Islamic / Swap-Free Option | ✓ Available on Request Swap-Free option available on request via support for eligible regions (no overnight interest fees charged) |
✓ Inherently Swap-Free (CME Futures) Inherently Swap-Free (Regulated CME futures exchange model; zero overnight holding and zero swap financing) |
| US Residents Accepted | ✓ Accepted | ✓ Accepted |
| Maximum Capital Allocation | $2,000,000 | $250,000 |
Where these figures come from. Read from FTMO's own published rules on : Maximum Loss and Maximum Daily Loss mechanics · 2-minute news blackout · Overnight and weekend holding · Forbidden practices · Current platform list · Eligibility · Payout mechanics · Scaling Plan. Prop firm rules change without notice — confirm on the firm's own site before you pay for an evaluation.
Where these figures come from. Read from TradeDay's own published rules on : Maximum drawdown mechanism and the $100k examp · Pricing/programme tables giving the per-size d · Tier-1 news auto-liquidation window (2 minutes · Consistency objective · Evaluation objectives per programme; cross-che · Funded ruleset · Overnight holding permitted across sessions; 1 · Fast Pass payout gate · Quick Pay payout policy · Payout processing timing · Account limits and the hedging prohibition wit · Withdrawal mismanagement clause tying large/fr · Section 23 Prohibited Conduct. Prop firm rules change without notice — confirm on the firm's own site before you pay for an evaluation.
What can end the account even if you are profitable
These are the rules people usually find out about after a payout is refused.
- FTMO: Once you are funded on a Standard account, you cannot open or close a trade within 2 minutes either side of a selected news release — a stop-loss or take-profit that fires inside that window counts too — and FTMO can terminate the account for it. source
- FTMO: On a funded Standard account you must close your positions shortly before the market closes for the weekend, and before any rollover or market break lasting more than 2 hours, or you break the account's rules. source
- FTMO: You cannot spread one position across correlated instruments or hold opposing trades just to make your daily profits look evenly spread — FTMO calls that artificially distributing profit without distributing risk, and it can delete the trades, fail you, cancel your payout or close your account. source
- FTMO: You cannot trade off price-feed glitches, display errors or delayed quotes, and FTMO says this counts against you even if you did it without realising, with the same penalties up to termination. source
- FTMO: You cannot let anyone else access or trade your account, trade someone else's account, or coordinate trades between your connected accounts or with other traders in your Program Group for manipulative purposes — FTMO can terminate every agreement you hold with them. source
- FTMO: If FTMO decides you broke any of these rules it can forfeit a payout you have already earned, not just close the account — so being profitable does not protect the money until it is paid. source
- FTMO: You cannot request your first payout until the 14th day after your first placed trade, however fast you hit the target. source
- TradeDay: TradeDay closes every open position 2 minutes before and 2 minutes after its own Tier-1 data releases (FOMC, CPI, non-farm payrolls, crude oil and natural gas inventories, crop production reports); one accidental breach is forgiven, but traders who keep trading through the window lose the account. source
- TradeDay: Once you are funded, trading within 2% of an exchange price limit loses you the funded account immediately — TradeDay forgives accidental slips on trading times, products and position sizes, but states no such grace period for this rule. source
- TradeDay: If an automated or high-frequency strategy fires more than 200 trades in a single day, TradeDay can delete that trading day and all of its profits, restart or close the account, or ban you from the platform entirely. source
- TradeDay: Going long a product in one of your TradeDay accounts while short the same product in another counts as hedging: you are offboarded and suspended, and you forfeit every dollar of profit sitting in all of your funded accounts, not just the account that hedged. source
- TradeDay: Signing up more than once under different usernames or email addresses is prohibited conduct under Section 23 of the terms, which lets TradeDay delete the trading day and all profits, restart or close the account, or ban you from the service. source
- TradeDay: During the evaluation no single day may account for more than 30% of your total profit so far on Quick Pay (45% on Fast Pass); going over does not fail you, but your profit target rises until that big day is diluted back under the cap. source
- TradeDay: On Fast Pass you cannot take your first payout until you have 5 profitable trading days that each clear a minimum profit for your account size ($100 on $25k, $150 on $50k, $200 on $100k, $250 on $150k), with the balance above your starting balance. source
- TradeDay: On Fast Pass funded sim accounts opened on or after 26 July 2026, a payout is also withheld if any single day makes up more than 45% of your total gross profit. source
- TradeDay: You cannot hold a position into the daily close: TradeDay auto-liquidates everything 10 minutes before the close of the product you are trading, and funded traders are required to be flat by then. source
- TradeDay: Withdrawing often or in large amounts so that your balance sits close to the trailing drawdown can be judged as mismanaging the account, and TradeDay may then refuse to invite you back for another evaluation. source
Drawdown Architecture: FTMO vs TradeDay
The fundamental differentiator between FTMO and TradeDay lies in how risk and liquidation thresholds are tracked:
FTMO: Static Equity-Based
FTMO applies a Static Equity-Based approach. Under this structure, your stop loss floor is anchored to balance intervals. This ensures that temporary floating open profits do not pull your stop loss floor higher in real-time.
TradeDay: End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing
TradeDay implements a End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing model. This provides traders with full intraday flexibility without the fear of open spikes ratcheting up their liquidation point.
The Trader's Verdict: Which Firm Should You Choose?
Depending on your trading style, asset preference, and capital requirements, here is how our research team segments the two providers:
Choose FTMO if you:
- Want Static Equity-Based risk management.
- Trade primarily CFD instruments with MT4, MT5, cTrader.
- Value Discretionary swing & algorithmic traders who value institutional payout credibility and the 2-Step's static equity drawdown cushion.
- Want the ability to hold swing positions over weekends and economic news releases.
- Seek up to $2,000,000 in maximum scaling capital.
Choose TradeDay if you:
- Prefer End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing execution terms.
- Trade FUTURES via Tradovate, NinjaTrader, TradingView.
- Value Serious futures traders seeking direct CME-regulated broker funding with no payout buffer and next-business-day disbursements.
- Require strict intraday liquidity and same-day/daily payout options.
- Want access to starting entry fees at $99.
Frequently Asked Questions: FTMO vs TradeDay
Which firm offers a better drawdown model between FTMO and TradeDay?
FTMO uses Static Equity-Based, while TradeDay utilizes End-of-Day (EOD) Trailing.
Traders who hold positions through volatile pullbacks typically favor FTMO, whereas scalpers capitalizing on quick momentum benefit from TradeDay.
Can I trade both FTMO and TradeDay accounts at the same time?
Yes. Many professional prop traders run trade copiers (such as Replikanto for NinjaTrader futures, or Social Trader Tools for MT4/MT5 CFDs) to mirror trades across both FTMO and TradeDay simultaneously, diversifying broker risk and maximizing total payout potential.
Which prop firm has faster payout disbursements?
FTMO processes payouts on a Bi-weekly (Every 14 days) or on-demand basis (14 days from first placed trade), whereas TradeDay operates on a On request with no buffer and no minimum trading period on Quick Pay; requests submitted before 5:30pm ET are processed the next business day, minimum $250 schedule (Quick Pay: none — withdraw from any positive balance; Fast Pass: 5 profitable trading days, each clearing a per-tier minimum profit ($100/$150/$200/$250 for $25k/$50k/$100k/$150k)). Both platforms support crypto and direct bank transfers.