TradeDay Review
TradeDay have been helping traders succeed and grow for over 25 years with education, coaching and funded accounts up to $100,000 with a 90% profit share for those who pass the evaluation challenge. If you prove you have what it takes to make money, they guarantee to fund you as a trader.
Steve Miley co-founded TradeDay, which has its headquarters in Chicago, Illinois, in 2020. Anyone interested in learning to trade can use it as a platform for education, coaching, and funding. To give traders the advantage they need in today’s markets, TradeDay offers expert trading resources like trader development programmes, live market commentary, and institutional-grade research. Aiming to level the playing field for aspiring merchants, TradeDay let you keep the entire first $5,000 you make, then 80% of the profits thereafter.
TradeDay set out to build a “virtual trading room” to deliver an environment that provides advantages professionals enjoy when they work at their trading desk at a bank, hedge fund, or proprietary trading group, as well as the capability to fund those with profitable trading strategies.
Over the course of more than 80 years in the futures market, they have successfully traded for a very long period, both as full-time and part-time traders. TradeDay have created professional trading groups, supervised and managed trading teams, and instructed hundreds of people in the trading craft. It is clear to see that they have plenty of trading experience!
The model offered by the company offers traders a platform for learning and the chance to take part in their evaluation challenge. Those that succeed in the challenge will be given money to begin their trading career. The competitors must meet particular goals and adhere to a set of criteria in order to complete the challenge. The business will give them start-up money if they meet the goals while abiding by the guidelines. The first $5,000 a trader makes is theirs to keep, along with 80% of all profits made after that. The traders’ subscription fees serve as the foundation for this model.
The evaluation is based on the core competencies of a profitable trading strategy, risk management, and discipline. The test will be challenging for some people, just like profitable trading may be challenging. However, TradeDay provides you all the resources you need to be successful, and you work at your own pace. Upon successful completion of the challenge, your funded trading account is ready for you.
Evaluation Challenge
The virtual trading environment serves as the setting for the Evaluation Challenge. You must accomplish three goals. They created two options to help cater to your needs within your budget.
- Make Money: Trade until you reach the profit target set for you
- Track Record: Trade for a minimum of 15 days
- Be Consistent: They want to back reliable traders
Beginner Program
You will have all you need to secure funding from the beginner program. It comes with all you need to know about futures markets, as well as resources for mentoring and tools to help you create your trading systems and become a better trader.
- Evaluation objectives and rules
- $50,000 Leveraged account
- Trade for a minimum of 15 days
- $2,000 profit target
- Be consistent
- $500 daily stop loss limit
- $1,500 trailing drawdown
- Max position size: 2 lots/20 micros, adding 1 lot for every $1000 in the trading account
- Close all positions before the end of day
- Only trade permitted products
Advanced Program
Not your first-time trading? In search of higher risk ceilings? The advanced program might be the best option if you feel that you would benefit from a monthly one-on-one session with James or Steve for the duration of the Evaluation Challenge.
- Trade for a minimum of 15 days
- $4,000 profit target
- Be consistent
- $1,000 daily stop loss limit
- $3,000 trailing drawdown
- Max position size: 4 lots/40 micros, adding 1 lot for every $1000 in the trading account
- Close all positions before the end of day
- Only trade permitted products
Pricing
With just two account sizes and the option to increase your possible trading size, TradeDay has kept things straightforward. Additionally, TradeDay provides a 14-day Free Trial without the need to add a credit card, something that is uncommon in the funded trading programme business. However, you will have to pay a data fee though since you are considered a professional trader once funded.
It’s important to remember that blowing up your account during the simulation trading phase carries costs. Failures in evaluations will be free of charge reset by TradeDay Funding upon renewal of the monthly membership fee. This implies that if you fail the Evaluation Challenge, you have two options: either pay $99 for a reset, which will allow you to try again right away, or wait until your membership price renews, at which point they will repeat the challenge for you.
| Account Size | Price/month | Contracts | Goal | Drawdown |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $50,000 | $165 | 2 | $2,000 | $1,500 |
| $100,000 | $350 | 4 | $4,000 | $3,000 |
TradeDay has some set rules and trading conditions that you need to follow in order to pass the evaluation phase. The review will end if you violate a rule while attempting to accomplish the objectives, and you will no longer be eligible for financing. There are clear guidelines that apply to everyone. Pass, and they will fund you without question.
Rules
The TradeDay official website offers an overview of the fundamental standards as well as some additional specifics. Some of the most important trading rules to be aware of include:
- 1 Step Evaluation
- Trade for 15 days
- Trailing Drawdown stops at the initial balance
- Trailing Drawdown is calculated at the end of day, not in between trades
- Do not hit the daily loss limit
- Follow the scaling plan
Reset
A reset token for the Evaluation Challenge costs $99 to purchase. This reset token verifies that you are serious about the challenge and lets you have another go at it. This is very handy in case you made a mistake during the challenge phase.
Payouts
Keep your first $5,000 in earnings and 80% of profits after that. Withdrawals are not subject to any limitations. As you add profit to your account, every $1,000 will earn you an additional contract you can trade. They do charge a small bank withdrawal fee for any amount under $500.
Scaling
TradeDay enable you to take on greater risk in the markets through larger trading positions as you trade and build up the amount in your trading account. This procedure is made plain and clear by the prop firm via a scaling plan.
Regardless of whether they are trading live or in a simulator, traders begin with the maximum position size allowed by the programme they have signed up for (Beginner vs Advanced). After that, for each $1,000 in profit in the trading account, they permit an extra contract.
In the example below, the Beginner account balance starts at $50,000. Then if the account balance increases to $51,000 the trader can trade up to 3 contracts. Account balances over $52,000 the trader can trade up to 4 contracts, etc.
Trailing Maximum Drawdown
The largest sum of money you are permitted to lose is called a maximum drawdown. A drawdown that follows the growth of your account is known as a trailing maximum drawdown (TMD). As the account makes money, it rises.
The trailing maximum drawdown does not change if your account value drops the following day as a result of trading losses because it is fixed to the highest level you have ever had. In order to determine if the TMD is changed on the Evaluation and live funded accounts, TradeDay uses your end-of-day balance.
When it reaches your starting account balance, the TMD stops trailing up. The TMD amount at TradeDay is determined on the programme you registered for. It costs $1,500 to enrol in the beginner programme, and $3,000 to enrol in the advanced programme.
The trader in the Advanced programme with a trailing drawdown of $3,000 is an example below.
The TMD freezes for the duration of the trading account when it reaches the initial beginning balance. You won’t be able to allow your trading account to go below the starting balance at this time.
TradeDay determines whether to increase or maintain your TMD limit based on the end-of-day trading account balance, in contrast to other prop trading firms. They think the trader has the best probability of success and “space to breathe” in this situation.
If, while participating in the Evaluation Challenge, you reach or surpass the trailing maximum drawdown during the trading day, you will fail the challenge and be required to pay for a reset before you may continue.
If you have a funded trading account and reach or exceed the trailing maximum drawdown during the trading day, you will lose that funding and must complete the Evaluation Challenge in order to regain it.
Profit Target
The amount of money you need to make trading is known as the profit aim objective. The adjustment will show up in your account balance. For instance, the Beginner account balance begins at $50,000, with a $2000 profit goal.
You must continue trading until your trading account balance equals or exceeds $52,000 in order to achieve this goal. The account balance starts at $100,000 when you sign up for the advanced account, and the profit goal is $4000. Continue trading until the balance of your account reaches $104,000 or more.
Please be aware that they factor in simulated commission when calculating your profit and loss since they want the experience to be as realistic as possible for when you are trading in the real market.
By completing this task, you demonstrate to TradeDay that you have begun to create profitable trading strategies and that you have the ability to generate profits on active markets.
Trading Days
There should be at least one deal made on each day that counts towards your goal total. A fresh trading notion necessitates the generation of each trade (just closing a trade before the close and re-opening the position when the market re-opens does not constitute and new trading idea).
There is no time restriction on you to complete the Evaluation Challenge, but you must have traded for a minimum of 15 days. Every day you make a trade will count towards this objective.
TradeDay is assessing your trading prowess; they want to support traders who can show a history of reliable trading success over time. They wouldn’t learn much about your ability if you were able to meet the profit goal in less than a week. They can evaluate your performance over time by requesting that you trade for at least 15 days.
Trading Hours
Due to the fact that TradeDay is a day trading firm, they mandate that traders close any open positions 10 minutes before the market closes. The Evaluation Challenge will be failed by traders who still have open positions after the market ends.
They strongly advise closing all open positions and deleting all orders from the order book at least 10 minutes before the market is scheduled to end in order to avoid breaking this rule. For example, if you are trading crude oil, the market closes daily at 4 pm CT, close all positions, and delete all orders in your order book, before 3.50 pm CT.
Consistency
No single day’s profit should account for more than 30% of overall earnings. You won’t fail your evaluation challenge if you do have a huge profit day, but you must continue trading until there are no days that account for more than 30% of your overall profits.
Stop Loss
Avoid exceeding or going over the daily stop loss. The total amount you may lose in a single day is this. For the beginner programme it is $500 and for the advance it is $1000. These sums contain simulated commission expenses.
Positions
The size of the positions you can trade depends on the amount of money in your trading account. Observe the Position Limit regulations and do not exceed the maximum position limitations. Ten minutes before the CME Globex trading day ends, you must close down all open positions.
Profit Share
Keep the first $5,000 you earn and 80% of income after that, with no withdrawal limitations. Whilst this is high, it is not quite on par with the likes of FundedNext and Apex Trader Funding who go all the way up to 90% with scaling plans to help you practice your trading strategies.
TradeDay have made an effort to provide a platform that is useful to you, that will help you develop as a trader, and that offers some of the tools that professional traders in banks, hedge funds, and professional trading groups use.
Inside the membership you will find:
- Free live market data
- A simulated trading platform with advanced charting analytics
- Daily Technical Analysis delivered by the Market Chartist
- Live market commentary delivered by LiveSquawk
- Courses provided by TradeDay, and courses provided by third parties where there is an area of expertise
- A community, with a feed for real-time chat, and forums to discuss topics at more length and in-depth
- Daily meetings, and regular live streams, to keep the market information and trading knowledge relevant
- The ability to get your trading funded with their capital
Platforms
When you sign up with TradeDay, you will connect using Tradovate, which is currently unusual because NinjaTrader is offered by the majority of prop firms such as Topstep. Because it is easy to use and learn, has a great user interface, and most importantly is web-based, Tradovate provides traders a host of advantages. It can be utilised on a PC, a Mac, a tablet, a phone, etc. Both a native Tradovate app and a web browser are supported.
All the essential charts for managing your day trading activities are included with Tradovate and are provided without charge. Beginners may become familiar with all the fundamental ideas with Tradovate, despite the fact that it lacks many of the sophisticated features of trading platforms like NinjaTrader and TradeStation. They do also offer NinjaTrader with TradeDay’s own free license (you cannot use your own license key at this time), fully integrated with Tradovate.
You will be utilising both Tradovate and a CQG feed. Although Rithmic is used by the majority of businesses, Rithmic has become increasingly unstable for some, therefore having CQG as your data source is also a great advantage. Of course, you can also use your own programme such as Jigsaw Daytradr and integrate it with TradigView. Additionally, once financed, Tradovate is still free to use!
Instruments
At TradeDay, they make an effort to provide a wide range of items. They have included most of the CME products but omitted illiquid, difficult to trade products, and high margin products. Below is a list of products that are available to trade at TradeDay:
- Equity Indexes
- FX Futures Pairs
- Interest rates
- Energy
- Metals
- Agricultural
There is a good variety of asset classes with something for everyone to trade. However, they are lacking in terms of individual stocks and don’t have quite as many financial instruments such as competitors including The Funded Trader.
Trading Tools
TradeDay provide professional tools to help the trader find their edge. This includes a live market commentary service, and institutional grade daily research free to traders. They also offer optional, free private coaching to advanced traders and funded traders.
Education
Have no prior experience trading futures? No need to worry as TradeDay offer programmes that will help improve your trading skills and knowledge of the markets from the ground up.
Mentoring
If you like to connect with and learn from those in the know, they have morning meetings every day, many live feeds, and a separate section for trader development.
Community
You can find the answers you need in the TradeDay forums section and live trading room chat. This is a great way to build relationships and share ideas with likeminded traders.
Trading Desk
TradeDay offer a performance-enhancing platform. It runs smoothly and quickly on iOS, MacOS, Windows, and Android. Anyone can use its array of handy features to take advantage of current market data.
24-hour Market Analysis
You can get 24-hour market commentary and news that is used by some of the big players including banks, hedge funds, and professional trading organisations.
Technical Analysis
Market Chartist technical analysis research reports have established a strong global, institutional client base since launching in 2012. Clients include global investment banks, institutional brokers, research boutiques, hedge funds, high net worth individuals, plus professional traders and investors. The MarketChartist award-winning research is delivered daily, and courses on developing your skills.
Simple Process
For everyone, the criteria for receiving funding are the same. If you pass the TradeDay exam, they will fund you. They keep things nice and simple whilst providing you with the educational resources and trading tools you need to succeed.
Trading Expenses
For those who qualify as funded traders, TradeDay is cost-free, and there are no additional trading commissions. Therefore, you won’t get hit with any unexpected charges like you can when trading with some other prop firms.
Free Trial
No credit card is needed to sign up for the TradeDay 14-day free trial. You can trade without limits on the simulated market, and you can take advantage of many of the website’s learning and mentorship features.
Free Guide
You can complete a short form on the TradeDay website and get instant access to a free trading guide that includes:
- The number one mistake new traders make when evaluating their trading
- Why your profit and loss can mislead you on how well you are trading
- Quantitative data vs qualitative data
- A look at some basic trading metrics
- An introduction to tracking your data
| Maximum capital | $100,000 |
| Profit split | Up to 90% |
| Scaling | Yes |
| News trading | Yes |
| Weekend trading | No |
| Automated trading | No |
| Free trial | Yes |
| Maximum leverage | 1:100 |
TradeDay is entirely legitimate and can be a terrific platform to evaluate your abilities as well as a great entry point into the world of full-time day trading with a prop firm. The variety of educational materials available to you can help you advance your day trading strategies to the next level.
Starting with one of two distinct account sizes, you can gradually raise your trading volume as your account balance rises. The 14-day Free Trial, which is not frequently seen in the prop trading industry, is something else that is worth mentioning. Without requiring any additional procedures, you may also begin trading with real money from day 1 and withdraw gains from day 1.
What is TradeDay?
Can anyone join TradeDay?
Additionally, they are unable to accept merchants from nations that are listed as OFAC Sanctioned Countries. These consist of: Iran, Iraq, Liberia, North Korea, Sudan, Syria, Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Belarus, Burma, Cote D’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Cuba, and the Balkans.
Please be aware that Canadian residents can open accounts with them. It will be regarded as a US trading account because you will be trading their capital in a TradeDay sub-account.
Is TradeDay regulated?
However, as a proprietary trading organisation, they take very seriously our legal responsibilities to follow by Exchange rules and regulations, as well as the related CFTC trading restrictions.
All traders who need money must complete a training programme that covers the pertinent rules and regulations, and they must sign a contract stating that they have read the terms and conditions and agree to abide by them while working for TradeDay.
Only regulated products are traded via TradeDay on regulated markets. TradeDay only employs licenced brokers.
Do I need to provide capital when trading live?
TradeDay is a platform for mentoring and education that also offers funding options for traders. If you take the Evaluation Challenge and succeed, they will guarantee to put money into your trading account.
What can I trade at TradeDay?
How do I get started?
Join the free trial if you want to spend some time practising with the platform or learning more about what TradeDay has to offer. There is no charge or need for a credit card.
Complete the registration form, and you are in!
There will be an introduction video when you first log in to the site to assist you navigate it.
Once you are familiar with the website, go to the Trading Room page to receive your daily technical analysis study reports, trading screen, rolling news service, and market commentary.
When you succeed in the evaluation challenge, they will open a trading account with their broker and deposit money into it on your behalf.
Which Trading Platform Does TradeDay use?
Can I have multiple accounts?
TradeDay is subject to limitations imposed by its clearing company, which only permits users to have a single trading account while they are active.
They wish to evaluate your capability to oversee a single trading account during the evaluation procedure.
Can I use copy trader?
They are evaluating your ability to profit from trading, so do not permit copy trading from another person’s account into your own.
Trading will be prohibited from the platform and we will fail the Evaluation Challenge if they believe traders are employing copy trading software.
Which FCM does TradeDay use?
Do you give free resets?
Alternatively, you can wait until your monthly membership renews, in which case they will be pleased to perform a reset for you at no cost.
For traders who are not being evaluated when their payment is processed, they carry out this reset automatically.
What happens if I fail the Evaluation Challenge?
You can call it a day, and cancel your membership to TradeDay.
You can purchase a reset, this is a $99 fee. It will restart your evaluation immediately and is independent of your monthly membership fee.
Or, you can wait until your monthly membership fee renews, and they will reset you for free.
You can only purchase a reset if you have a live membership with TradeDay.
Can I trade over major economic announcements?
Will TradeDay evaluate and fund scalpers?
Are there any fees when I am funded?
Trading commissions are directly deducted from the balance of your trading account.
The monthly market data charge is $122 according to the Exchange.
You are charged directly by your credit card for the CME Market Data costs. They are outside the control of TradeDay.
You are now a Market Professional and are therefore liable to the CME’s Market Professional data charge because you are now trading TradeDay’s capital.
However, as long as you continue to be a live, funded trader at TradeDay, they won’t charge you a monthly membership fee and will continue to pay for any platform fees, liveSquawk connection fees, and delivered technical analysis research. You are also welcome to continue using the membership site at no additional cost.
Can I trade longer term positions?
Due to the fact that TradeDay is a day trading organisation, all traders are required to close any open positions before the close of their respective goods on that day. This aids in risk management for both you and them when dealing with trading funds.
Trading after hours is permitted, but they need the position to be terminated before the market closes the following day. For example, the trading day for crude oil lasts 23 hours, closing at 4 pm CT and opening again at 5 pm CT. After 5 PM, you can open a position that will remain open until Crude Oil closes at 4 PM the following day.
Are there any inactivity fees
What is the TradeDay refund policy?
Take advantage of the 14-day free trial with no commitment to buy and no credit card required if you are unsure whether TradeDay is the appropriate place for you.
They cannot process refunds or prorate refunds for charges that occur close to a successfully completed Evaluation Challenge since all membership costs are deemed to have been fully utilised.
