Apex Trader Funding

Apex Trader Funding has been a popular choice for Futures traders due to the consistent and often deep discounts offered to traders. Often you can take 50-70% off your challenge and during special times of the year even 70-90%. You can see current valid coupons at the end of this review.

As we have stated before, however, price should never be the deciding factor, when choosing a prop fund. Sometimes low-cost prop funds are high risk.

Apex Trader Funding offers a similar evaluation to Take Profit Trader. Both offer Tradovate and Rithmic evaluations, but there are some major differences you should be aware of:

Primary Differences:

1. Max Account Limits: While Take Profit Trader restricts traders to only 3 total accounts, Apex Trader Funding permits up to 20 total accounts.
2. Initial Cost: The retail prices for challenges are relatively similar between Take Profit Trader and Apex Trader Funding. The key difference is in the discounts offered. Currently, Take Profit Trader is offering a 40% discount, while Apex Trader Funding has a 71% discount. For perspective, a $100k challenge at Apex Trader Funding currently costs $65.83, compared to $198 at Take Profit Trader, amounting to a $132.17 difference. Similarly, a $25k challenge at Apex Trader Funding is priced at $48.43, while it costs $90 at Take Profit Trader, a difference of $41.57.
3. Monthly Fees: While Apex Trader Funding definitely has the upper hand on initial costs, Take Profit Trader does not charge a recurring monthly fee once you pass their challenge. You do however have to pay a one-time “setup fee.” So if you passed a $100k challenge in one month you would pay Take Profit Trader $328 with no recurring fees after. For the same challenge on Apex Trader Funding you would pay a total of $65.83 which means you could essentially take almost 5-months to pass the Apex challenge, paying their fee every month, before you would spend as much as one month with Take Profit Trader.

The Apex Trader Funding Challenge

• Entry cost: $167/month (before discounts) for $25k in funding. The challenge fee is non-refundable
  Apex offers a range of funding options. While monthly fees continue for a “PA” account even after funding, there is an option to pay a one-time lifetime fee, eliminating the need for any further monthly payments.
  Lifetime fees:
  25k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee $130
  50k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee $140
  75k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee $180
  100k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee (full and static account) $220
  150k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee $260
  250k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee $300
  300k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee $340
• Challenge: One-step program requiring 6% profit in the evaluation, with trailing threshold of 6% making it an equal ratio, unlike Take Profit Trader. However, only the $25k and $50k accounts have equal and near equal profit/drawdown ratios.
• Trailing Drawdown: Apex has only one drawdown which is a dynamic trailing drawdown. Trailing drawdown stops trailing once you reach a profit of your total drawdown + $100
  The drawdown percentage varies by capital of account:
  $25k – 6% Drawdown, 6% Profit
  $50k – 5% Drawdown, 6% Profit
  $75k – 3.6% Drawdown, 5.6% Profit
  $100k – 3% Drawdown, 6% Profit
  $150k – 3.3% Drawdown, 6% Profit
  $250k – 2.6% Drawdown, 6% Profit
  $300k – 2.5% Drawdown, 6.6% Profit
• Daily loss limit: None
• Max contracts: If you try to trade more than this limit your order will be rejected but you will not lose your account
  $25K acct: 4 contracts or 40 micros
  $50k acct: 10 contracts or 100 micros
  $75k acct: 12 contracts or 120 micros
  $100k acct: 14 contracts or 140 micros
  $150k acct: 17 contracts or 170 micros
  $250k acct: 27 contracts or 270 micros
• No time limit to complete challenge, however, you will be paying a monthly reoccurring fee
• No inactivity rule: You will not fail your account if you don’t trade for a certain length of time
• Minimum of 7 Trading Days required to pass.
• News trading: Apex explicitly states, “News trading in any form, including any kind of directional trading, straddles, strangles, riding the initial news ‘burst,’ or entering trades right before or after news to ride a potential wave, is strictly prohibited.” However, they also state that you may “trade during the news” if it is part of your normal strategy.
• Holding overnight/weekend is not allowed and may cause you to lose your account. Apex does sometimes close your positions on your behalf but don’t risk leaving trades open
• No executions limit
• Price limits set by CME, if hit may trigger account loss
• Consistency rule: This applies only to PA funded accounts, not to evaluations. At the time of a withdrawal request, the profit balance must not consist of more than 30% profit from a single trading day. They clarify that this is not a “hard and fast rule” but is intended to discourage risky trading.

Fees

The prop firm sets and collects the fees.

Tradovate:

• $3 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  E-Mini Dow
  E-Mini S%P 500
  E-Mini Nasdaq
  E-MIni Russell
• $3.54 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  All currency futures except E-Mini Japanese Yen and Euro FX
• $4.54 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  All Ag Futures except Minis which are $2.40
• $3.34 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  All Energy Futures except Minis which are $2.74
• $3.44 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  All Metal Futures except Minis which are $1.84
• $1.04 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  Most Micro Futures
• $5.34 per round trip per contract for following instruments:
  Micro Bitcoin

Payout

Traders eligible for payout receive 100% of the first $25,000 in profits earned, then 90% thereafter.

Profit Withdrawal Limitations

To be eligible for withdrawal, you must have a total of ten separate trading days where trades are placed, according to Apex guidelines, meaning you can’t just enter tiny lot trades to fill days. They want you to trade actual legitimate trades only. The ten days reset every withdrawal request. Also, to request withdrawal your account must have surpassed the trailing drawdown plus $100. See example below:

REQUIRED Minimum Balance To Request a Withdrawal (each period):

• $25k Account- $26,600
• $50k Account- $52,600
• $75k Account- $77,850
• $100k Account- $103,100
• $150k Account- $155,100
• $250k Account- $256,600
• $300k Account- $307,600
• $100k Static Account- $102,600

Unlike some futures prop funds, you are not required to leave a buffer or “safety net” in your account. You have the option to withdraw the trailing buffer, but doing so leaves no margin for loss. Therefore, if your next trade is a losing one, you risk losing your account. Thus, unless you are prepared to close your account, it’s advisable to maintain some buffer in your account.

The first through third payout months have a minimum payout of $500. For the first 3 months there is also a max withdrawal limit. Below are the max withdrawal limits for each payout period (twice monthly):

• $25k Account- $1500
• $50k Account- $2000
• $75k Account- $2,250
• $100k Account- $2,500
• $150k Account- $2,750
• $250k Account- $3,000
• $300k Account- $3,500
• $100k Static Account- $1,000

For instance, in an account with $100,000, withdrawals are limited to $5,000 per month for the first four months. Profits not withdrawn in this period will accumulate and be available for withdrawal later. This restriction applies per PA account; therefore, if you possess two $100,000 accounts, you can withdraw up to $10,000 each month during the initial three months.

While this rules has gotten flack you have to consider that other prop firms impose

Restrictions

It is very important to understand that while you will have access to a variety of instruments to trade you are not allowed to trade certain pairs. If you try your trader will simply be rejected

Also, you must close all your trades before 5PM Eastern time or you could lose your account.

If the price of a specific instrument hits a price ceiling set by CME, you will automatically lose your account.

Verdict

Apex Trader Funding stands out as the premier choice for trading with futures prop firms. After trading a variety of different futures prop firms we rank Apex Trader Funding at #1 for its outstanding trading environment and the fairest evaluation conditions. With Apex, you get access to larger contract sizes, a more generous trailing drawdown, and considerably lower fees than its competitors. It’s unfortunate that no futures prop funds currently offer genuine static drawdown options. Apex’s static plan, with a $625 drawdown, is impractical. Therefore, we suggest purchasing only their full plans, which greatly decreases your risk of losing your account.

One of the greatest factors in rating and ranking Prop Funds beyond analyzing their fee structures is the ratio of profit to loss requirements. Many prop firms have terrible ratios which are designed to make you fail.

Get notified about new discounts!

We will notify you as soon as Apex Trader Funding has a new discount

Notify me!

You have signed up for notifications for Apex Trader Funding discounts