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  • #5,141
  • Jan 3, 2021 1:22pm Jan 3, 2021 1:22pm
Quoting mizi123
I hope you have spend good new year days "at home mostly"! Most asked question and required answer, around 92% of FTMO participants lose their challanges have good luck in 2021 FTMO succes still same as watching Miley on youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aS1no1myeTM
how is your funded account doing ?
Intraday only.
  • #5,142
  • Jan 3, 2021 1:27pm Jan 3, 2021 1:27pm
Quoting navk
{quote} how is your funded account doing ?
I have lost her long time ago... i have told about these but maybe you have missed that post...
  • #5,143
  • Jan 4, 2021 4:08am Jan 4, 2021 4:08am
Quoting nikosk0
{quote} I have a stop loss just in case at -1500 and if the trade goes at -1100-1300 i add one more posiiton of the same size and exit either for small profit or big profit.
Hi!
Happy New Year!
-1500 is in points or equity loss?
You are cost averaging down.
You will take maximum risk 2000 and that's it?

With thanks,
SP
  • #5,144
  • Jan 4, 2021 7:18am Jan 4, 2021 7:18am
a bunch of people are dming me with conspiracies about FTMO. I want to address them having been a broker (of all sorts) since 2006.

1) No, I don't think FTMO is a bucketshop, because there are not a constant flow of deposits. The average trader deposits more than the cost of the trial and has to trade it to lose it. FTMO returns the fee back to successful people (about 5% of people statistically) + pays out over a million dollars a month in profit shares. To maintain a bucket type model for this they would have to be getting tens of thousands of people every month doing the challenge. According to their traffic stats, i doubt that is the case. 1000 sure, 10,000 maybe on a good month but not regularly. Also the model suggests a tapering off of traffic over time.

2) It is clear they are earning from the trading conditions one way or another. My guess from my experience is a c-book approach, a better fill execution which will give them a reasonable per lot clip of the ticket. This model is likely more profitable given the amount of trades being executed than a bucket approach and way more manage-able providing traders continue to pass the challenge and volume continues growing. Market has been super volatile though, so volume could shrink, but this model makes the most sense, requires the least amount of staff and long term costs the least amount of money. This is my opinion based on the facts infront of me.

3) Having been funded now, i can tell you FTMO are not trading against their clients. There have been no price irregularities, no strange slippage or stop hunting. Their futures priced on my screen changed to not track the DOW but the price was still executable in good faith and there are no irregular market behaviors. I do not see them as manipulating anything or doing anything on purpose to cause traders to lose (which provides further evidence to point 1).

4) If FTMO did provide free challenges to everyone, then people would just gamble all in over and over and over again until they pass. This would be stupid. I don't know how they came up with their price structure, i don't think it needs to be as high as it is, but people are willing to pay it so c'est la vie. Just because they "Charge" you to take the challenge, doesn't mean thats the revenue model of the company. Especially when successful people get the challenge fee returned. If you know the up-keep of having your own metatrader server, the staffing behind it, the liquidity costs etc, you would know that if 1000 people take the challenge, you are barely profiting from the challenge fees. Certainly not enough to be considered some elaborate scheme.

Conclusion to me is that people asking these questions are people who either failed the challenge, know they can't pass the challenge, or are too scared to do the challenge because they can't risk the money to pay for it. Everyones situation is different of course but FTMO so far to me are completely legitimate. As with every company there is room for improvement but considering whats on offer I think its a pretty good deal.

Metrix didn't update for me for 10 hours last week which was upsetting, as an example of what could be improved upon, that is one thing.
  • #5,145
  • Jan 4, 2021 7:40am Jan 4, 2021 7:40am
Quoting SuperPip
{quote} Hi! Happy New Year! -1500 is in points or equity loss? You are cost averaging down. You will take maximum risk 2000 and that's it? With thanks, SP
my max allowed risk is 4000€. i will risk 1500€ not points (that will be hit only cause of spikes in my system, it cannot be hit otherwise, especially in london session its impossible)

also, it works in my system and my mentality. i do not think it is going to work in yours so dont try it
offering my system to copy trade. check my link
  • #5,146
  • Jan 4, 2021 8:27am Jan 4, 2021 8:27am
Quoting chandana47
Hi folks ! what is the winter gmt and summer gmt for ftmo?
Nobody answered. I'll do it.
It is now GMT/UTC +1 (Time difference to GMT/UTC = 0)
But...

Quoting Tomas-ftmo
Hello Fx11trade, this issue arises from the fact that we have our server time aligned with CE(S)T and thus the standard market rollover time falls to 23:00-23:05. The server time was aligned to CE(S)T in order to make it easier for our traders to see when exactly does the Max Daily Loss counter reset, but we received multiple reports similar to yours, and the decision has been made to change the server time to GMT +2, so the market rollovers are at 00:00-00:05, same as most other brokers have. This change is preliminarily scheduled to be done on...
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe
  • #5,147
  • Jan 4, 2021 9:09am Jan 4, 2021 9:09am
Quoting SuperPip
{quote} Hi! Happy New Year! -1500 is in points or equity loss? You are cost averaging down. You will take maximum risk 2000 and that's it? With thanks, SP
my verification so far (remember i take it slow so risk is lees than that of a challenge and more like the actuall risk i am gonna take on the funded account. i still havcent traded the funded acount, waiting 7 more days for 2nd verification to merge the accounts, then i will trade the funded account and after the first withdrawal i will go for a 3rd challenge and merge that too.

target for each account is 500 a day more or less and total daily risk no more than 2k. just go slow and dont be greedy, if greedy and you take a loss of near the daily limit youre prety much done for, (learned this the hard way trust me). pscology goes to abyss and you only gamble to go back to positive and its just a roller coaster from there on

in the end, today i could have made a lot of money from eu since it droped a lot but i had already nearly got my daily target so there was no point to risk loosing it.
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offering my system to copy trade. check my link
  • #5,148
  • Jan 4, 2021 9:11am Jan 4, 2021 9:11am
I lost my first challenge and I will like to apply for another one but before then, I will suggest that FTMO should consider reviewing their challenge fees down ward to allow traders to be able to take the challenge as many time as possible until one passes it especially traders like me that are living in Nigeria where our monthly minimum wage is less than $100 dollars.

Rewarding it down wards will not affect FTMO income but rather, it will give access to more traders all around the world to try out their challenge and also afford FTMO opportunity to have more traders on their platform.

Thank you.
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  • #5,149
  • Jan 4, 2021 9:35am Jan 4, 2021 9:35am
Quoting stirmatt
I lost my first challenge and I will like to apply for another one but before then, I will suggest that FTMO should consider reviewing their challenge fees down ward to allow traders to be able to take the challenge as many time as possible until one passes it especially traders like me that are living in Nigeria where our monthly minimum wage is less than $100 dollars. Rewarding it down wards will not affect FTMO income but rather, it will give access to more traders all around the world to try out their challenge and also afford FTMO opportunity...

The minimum wage in Venezuela is less than 5 dollars. According to your reasoning, how much should FTMO charge so that Venezuelan citizens also have a chance?

I don't think you thought that the goal of FTMO and any other company is to make a profit and not do charity.
  • #5,150
  • Jan 4, 2021 9:52am Jan 4, 2021 9:52am
Quoting TrendLover
{quote} The minimum wage in Venezuela is less than 5 dollars. According to your reasoning, how much should FTMO charge so that Venezuelan citizens also have a chance? I don't think you thought that the goal of FTMO and any other company is to make a profit and not do charity.
Make profit from funded accounts not necessarily from challenge fee. The aim of challenge fee should be to reduce the abuse of the whole process and not to serve as a major source of income except if I am missing something.

If the cost is reduced more people will apply for it and if their aim is to generate income from the fee then the number of traders applying for the challenge will generate such income.

It will be win win for both traders and FTMO if I am not wrong.
  • #5,151
  • Jan 4, 2021 1:42pm Jan 4, 2021 1:42pm
Quoting stirmatt
I lost my first challenge and I will like to apply for another one but before then, I will suggest that FTMO should consider reviewing their challenge fees down ward to allow traders to be able to take the challenge as many time as possible until one passes it especially traders like me that are living in Nigeria where our monthly minimum wage is less than $100 dollars. Rewarding it down wards will not affect FTMO income but rather, it will give access to more traders all around the world to try out their challenge and also afford FTMO opportunity...
Good luck as you retake it! Learn any good lessons? One note on the fee; were you able to take advantage of the recent sale? The sale prices were close to what you suggest. I grabbed 2 myself (more on my experience in a moment).

If you happen to have the funds, which I know can be a challenge, might be worth asking if they could just extend the sale. Doubt it, but can't hurt to ask and mention the particular constraints you're working with. Otherwise, I guess follow their Twitter and just pounce if they ever do another one.

Other thought, depending on the size you were taking on, is to do the smallest one then use profits to fund larger one. A trade-off though. For me I found 50k to be the best size for the instruments/strategies I wanted to trade. In retrospect 100k would have been better than numerous 50k ones but oh well, and I do have to admit I had to refine my risk management for their particular equity vs drawdown requirements. Different than my typical style but adding a good skill set to my toolbox.
  • #5,152
  • Jan 4, 2021 1:48pm Jan 4, 2021 1:48pm
Happy news on a previous FTMO issue but a concerning current issue.

I reported on some issues in the past which I would like to say first of all that FTMO handled very satisfactorily. My only suggestion would be they give front-line support more leeway to guarantee challenges will be credited time in the event they agree there was a genuine issue. This is detailed on the reporting page which would also be good to draw attention to as it has procedures for what to do if you encounter an issue.

Unfortunately I just ran into a much more serious issue that cost me a couple grand and nearly my challenge account.

FTMO daily (not overall) loss is acting as a trailing drawdown (from the high of the day, not from the daily opening equity). This is the opposite of their posted rules and I've confirmed with support how it's supposed to work.

I've seen this in 2 challenge accounts now and have detailed documentation; support assured me I had plenty of room since I was close to breakeven, but as soon as I put on a trade the system claimed I was close to $2000 daily loss. Asking them to bust the 2 trades I closed rather than reversed as soon as I saw risk of triggering the limit, costing me $840 not counting the $3000 profit I missed out on. Confident FTMO will make it right but would recommend double-checking any supposed daily loss violation very carefully.

....................................................

Long and gory details below, concerning 2 challenges I purchased during the recent sale.

I started a new challenge and ran into an issue where the daily loss limit triggered differently than MetriX reported. Once that happened I looked closer and saw that it had been partially updating. This is different from the issue where it stops updating overall given one would not see that it's in fact not updating in order to report it. I ended up violating the overall limit though so I chalked it up to a glitch.

But then in the other challenge, I encountered the same thing! Brand new account, so of course the permitted daily loss was $2500 aka at $47500 equity. Got up $800 in fairly short order, then unfortunately gave it back. When I paused to ensure I wasn't chasing, I looked at MetriX and it was showing me down $1014 even though my lowest equity was $49786. Contacted support, had to work a while to convince them it was real. But they assured me it would be good from there and I had to $47500 for the day.

But then as soon as I entered a new trade and it dipped, it started me showing down further and further, edging toward $2500. So I closed everything immediately. I followed up again with support to add this to the ticket. Right now, I have absolutely confirmed from my end that FTMO daily loss is acting as a trailing drawdown, not as described. The value shown for max daily loss always matched my absolute high of the day, including daily profit, subtracted from my current equity.

Screenshot attached. Annotated to show key points. I also gave them a screenshot of my trading client showing there were no lower wicks or anything.

The dip at the end is where I was long 2 BTCUSD and closed it as soon as I saw the combination of support failing (right before the big rug pull, ha) and the incorrect value. It's really frustrating because my plan was to reverse, not exit, my position if that level failed. And sure enough it dropped $1500 or so. So now because I did only half of my play I'm down $840 rather than up $2000.

I've asked them to credit the time for investigation (because I'm not touching the account until then) and to bust those last trades. I've done a number of challenges so far and never once asked for a trade to be reversed (barring that time the market closed early, but that worked out). Here, though, I was quite confident in my trade plan but couldn't afford the risk of a dead cat bounce triggering the daily limit even though I was nowhere close. I'm not asking for what I "would have" done. But I want to be back before I began executing my plan, which I only aborted due to this bug.

Hopeful they will make this right and of course I will keep the community updated.
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  • #5,153
  • Jan 4, 2021 2:11pm Jan 4, 2021 2:11pm
Quoting Tomas-ftmo
Hello Turtletrad3r, short answer is this situation would not breach Max Daily Loss - assuming there are no other positions executed. The equation important for the purposes of Max Daily Loss is: Current daily result = results of closed positions of this day + result of open positions. (https://ftmo.com/en/#maximum-daily-loss) In your example, assuming no other trades are executed, your Daily Result during both days would be positive as the position is in floating profit the entire time (with exception of being hit with spread upon opening...)....
Tomas, thanks for participating here and detailing this. I'm glad to hear the rules are as I understood them. They are also how support explained to me.

Didn't think to tag you before but want to draw your attention to my post above. The rules as you describe them are quite clear but unfortunately not how the system is acting. The max daily loss is being calculated from the absolute high of the day. It is not being tracked as the current daily result overall. It is acting as a trailing drawdown from the start of the day, not fixed.

I'm 100% confident of this situation and have provided evidence above, plus additional evidence to FTMO support. Happy to share here as well if there are any questions whatsoever. Also happy to discuss and answer any questions and would even do so under penalty of perjury.

Quoting Tomas-ftmo
Hi Fxsniper111, The Max Daily Loss and Max loss stays the same on Challenge/Verification/FTMO Account. We believe that traders should limit their loses and take a break if they incur significant losses in one day as revenge trading is a common phenomenon. By having Max Daily Loss even during FTMO stage, we hope to help our traders achieve better results. By staying within the Max Daily Loss limit, traders also show discipline, which is a core skill we are looking for in our FTMO Traders.
I fully agree with this. Unfortunately in this case out of an abundance of caution, when I saw that even after reassured by support that the system was not behaving correctly, I immediately stopped trading midway through a trade plan and lost a good deal of money when I would have been up significantly.

I've given FTMO a good deal of money on challenges, adapting my style to the equity/drawdown requirements, and have never once before asked for a trade to be busted. But I'm asking for this one single issue to be made right (and the bug fixed, of course). I'm not asking that my account be credited with all the profit I would have made. I'm not even asking for it to be reset (though if you were to do that as a reward for finding this issue it would be wonderful). I'm just asking for the investigation time restored, and the 2 BTCUSD trades 1631463 and 1631465 canceled so I'm not down $840 when I should be up $2000, purely due to this bug and respecting the limits.
  • #5,154
  • Jan 4, 2021 3:08pm Jan 4, 2021 3:08pm
god or whatever diety there is bless volatility.
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  • #5,155
  • Jan 4, 2021 4:28pm Jan 4, 2021 4:28pm
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Quoting delta-vega
{quote} Tomas, thanks for participating here and detailing this. I'm glad to hear the rules are as I understood them. They are also how support explained to me. Didn't think to tag you before but want to draw your attention to my post above. The rules as you describe them are quite clear but unfortunately not how the system is acting. The max daily loss is being calculated from the absolute high of the day. It is not being tracked as the current daily result overall. It is acting as a trailing drawdown from the start of the day, not fixed. I'm 100%...
I have been working on the theory that the daily max loss is calculated by the difference between the highest point of the balance and the lowest of the equity during the day...

on my max drawdown day, Dec 11, attached above, (the red line is balance, the blue line is equity) I was down $4268 by this measure, and the Metrix agrees.

A few things about this:

1. both equity and balance were rising all day, approximately.

2. when equity was at its lowest, it was only $2640 less than balance.

3. that $2640 difference is the largest difference of the whole day.

4. when balance was highest, it was only $800 more than equity.



Thoughts anyone? Have I misunderstood anything? Tomas?
  • #5,156
  • Jan 4, 2021 4:38pm Jan 4, 2021 4:38pm
One thing that I wonder...
if this is true, would I then then be in violation if the the balance rose to $5k above the equity low?
do I have to refrain from closing trades to avoid this?
  • #5,157
  • Jan 4, 2021 6:12pm Jan 4, 2021 6:12pm
Unfortunately there are serious problems with the Max loss day.
I have been saying this for several days.

Today I found myself with an added result. The day before I was at around -2200 and today after the first around -350, I had greatly exceeded -2500.
The first loss of the day was added to that of the previous day.
Also you have to wait many hours to get an updated Matrix report. In some cases over 10 hours. And then you have to struggle with assistance and hope that everything goes well?

These are serious problems, which cause the loss of the Trial ... the Challenge and the Verification. Not to mention the risk even on a funded account (even if it is more difficult because it is not necessary to pull the rope). But if the Matrix is wrong, isn't it always wrong?

I bought a Challenge.
Now, in what spirit do I have to face this? How can I face this challenge with serenity, which is already difficult without additional problems to hinder even more?

That's no good. Not good at all.
FTMO must act immediately with reliable solutions and give clear and safe answers. NOW
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe
  • #5,158
  • Jan 4, 2021 6:25pm Jan 4, 2021 6:25pm
Quoting Trader-IT
Unfortunately there are serious problems with the Max loss day. I have been saying this for several days. Today I found myself with an added result. The day before I was at around -2200 and today after the first around -350, I had greatly exceeded -2500. The first loss of the day was added to that of the previous day. Also you have to wait many hours to get an updated Matrix report. In some cases over 10 hours. And then you have to struggle with assistance and hope that everything goes well? These are serious problems, which cause the loss of the...

The daily loss is floating and resets on the day. I have not had a problem with its calculation thus far, i have had a problem with metrix and their EA that has the information on it not updating but I haven't had a problem with the max loss being different to what I see on my daily situation. But I do not carry trades overnight, so perhaps thats the difference. The problem seems to be with carry over day to day.
  • #5,159
  • Jan 4, 2021 6:35pm Jan 4, 2021 6:35pm
Also, if closing a few positions, best to close the losers first, so the balance comes down. If done winners first, the balance rises... perhaps to max dd...
  • #5,160
  • Jan 4, 2021 7:26pm Jan 4, 2021 7:26pm
@Tomas

I know any changes are not easy to implement for many reasons, but please consider a more simple formula for the daily drawdown max...

perhaps, "You may not lose more than 5% of your opening balance on the account between the open and close of any one day".

Thus, if your equity was 102,000 on 100k account at the beginning of the day, your equity may not drop below 97,000 on that day. That's all.
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