Prop Firm Rules: A Complete Guide for 2026

Key Trading Guidelines and Risk Parameters

To ensure a fair and stable trading environment, please adhere to the following operational rules. These guidelines are designed to promote consistent risk management and long-term success.

Account Activity and Management

• Inactivity Rule: All accounts will be automatically deactivated after a period of 30 consecutive days without any trading activity. To prevent deactivation, please ensure you log in and place a trade. Deactivated accounts cannot be recovered.
• Drawdown Reset on Alpha One Accounts: For Alpha One account holders, if you achieve a 6% profit, your trailing maximum drawdown will reset to your initial balance. It is crucial to maintain a profit buffer to continue trading. Withdrawing your entire profit buffer will lead to the closure of the account.
• Qualified Analyst Allocation: The maximum capital allocation for any single trading strategy on a Qualified Analyst Account is capped at $300,000. A "strategy" is defined by the specific assets being traded.

Prohibited Trading Practices

• All-or-Nothing Strategy: Engaging in "all-or-nothing" trading practices, where an account's entire margin is risked on a single outcome, is strictly prohibited.
• High-Frequency Order Spamming: Placing an excessive number of orders in a very short timeframe is not permitted.
• Risk Management Violations: Consistently risking or losing 2% or more of your account balance on a single trade—or on a series of correlated trades closed simultaneously—is considered improper risk management and is forbidden.

Specific Trading Rules

• Average Trade Duration: The average duration of all trades executed on your account must be greater than two minutes. Additionally, at least 50% of any requested profit must originate from trades that were held for longer than two minutes.
• News Trading Regulations:
  • Qualified Analyst Swing Accounts: News trading is permitted. However, if a trade is opened within the 4-minute window (2 minutes before to 2 minutes after a high-impact news event), it must remain open for more than 2 minutes to be considered valid.
  • Alpha Pro Accounts: Trading is restricted during the 4-minute window around high-impact news (2 minutes before and 2 minutes after).
  • Alpha One, Alpha Pro 6%, and Alpha Three Accounts: Trading is restricted during a 10-minute window around high-impact news (5 minutes before and 5 minutes after).
  • Evaluation Programs: News trading is permitted without any restrictions during all evaluation phases.

Maximum Lot Sizes (Funded Accounts)

The maximum permissible lot size depends on your account type and balance.

• For Alpha One, Alpha Pro, Alpha Pro 6%, and Alpha Three Accounts:
  • $5k: 2.5 lots
  • $10k: 5 lots
  • $25k: 10 lots
  • $50k: 20 lots
  • $100k: 40 lots
  • $200k: 80 lots
  • $300k: 120 lots
• For Alpha Swing Accounts:
  • $5k: 1.25 lots
  • $10k: 2.5 lots
  • $25k: 5 lots
  • $50k: 10 lots
  • $100k: 20 lots
  • $200k: 40 lots
  • $300k: 60 lots

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Understanding Key Trading Rules & Guidelines

To successfully pass a prop firm challenge and maintain a funded account, traders must adhere to specific trading and risk management guidelines. The following rules are designed to promote a sustainable and disciplined approach to trading.

Core Trading & Risk Rules

1. Maintain a Strategy-Based Approach

All trading activity must be founded on proper market analysis. We prohibit strategies that depend on speculative or one-sided directional bets without clear justification.

2. Avoid High-Volume Gambling

Placing an excessive volume of trades in a very short period is considered gambling behavior and is not permitted. Trading should be strategic, not speculative.

3. Understanding the Excessive Scalping Rule

While scalping is a valid method, we define excessive scalping as any account where 50% or more of the total trades are held for less than one minute. This practice is prohibited.

4. The "All-In" Rule & Mandatory Stop-Loss

Committing a disproportionately large percentage of your account equity to a single trade violates our risk policy. A mandatory stop-loss is required for all positions to ensure sound risk management.

5. Prohibition of Revenge Trading

Engaging in "revenge trading"—entering a trade to recover losses immediately after closing a losing position—is strictly prohibited as it contradicts disciplined trading principles.

Account Management Policies

6. Account Activity and Inactivity

To keep your account active, you must place at least one trade within any 30-day period. Accounts inactive for 30 consecutive days are subject to suspension.

7. Adhering to Exposure and Position Limits

Traders must respect our exposure limits at all times: a maximum of 4 open positions per asset pair and a total of 7 open positions across all instruments.

8. Martingale and Cost-Averaging Strategies

The use of the Martingale strategy or any similar cost-averaging tactic that involves increasing position size after a loss is strictly prohibited.

Event-Specific Restrictions

9. Navigating High-Impact News Trading

Strict rules apply during high-impact news events (red folder) to protect accounts from extreme volatility.

• Restricted Window: Do not open or close trades from 2 minutes before to 2 minutes after the news release.
• All Execution Types: This rule applies to manual closures and automated triggers like Take Profit (TP) or Stop Loss (SL) during the restricted window.
• Stop-Loss Exception: A violation will not occur if a trade was opened more than 6 hours before the news and is closed by its stop-loss during the window.

10. Copy Trading Guidelines

Copy trading is permitted, but only for your own personal accounts.

Program Rules & Lot Sizes

11. The 30% Profit Consistency Rule

In applicable programs, your single highest-profit day cannot exceed 30% of your total profits for a payout period. You cannot request a payout until this condition is met.

12. Specific Rules for the Stock Program

The following practices are prohibited within the Stock Program:

• Market Open/Close: No trading is allowed in the first 5 minutes after market open or the last 5 minutes before market close.
• Earnings Releases: Trading a stock is forbidden within the 5-minute window before and after its earnings release.
• Prohibited Strategies: Martingale strategies are not allowed.
• Mandatory Stop-Loss: Every trade must have a stop-loss.
• Post-Loss Cooldown: After a losing trade on an asset, you must wait at least 5 minutes before trading it again.
• Portfolio Diversity: Your portfolio cannot consist only of small-cap stocks when passing an evaluation or requesting a payout.

13. Understanding the Tiered Lot Size System

Our platform uses a tiered lot size system that scales with your account balance, ensuring risk exposure remains proportional to your capital.

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14. Maximum Lot Size by Asset Class

The table below outlines the maximum lot size per trade based on account balance.

Understanding The5%ers Profit Split

The5ers offers a competitive profit split that is designed to reward successful traders, with the potential to scale up to a full 100% share. The structure varies by program:

• Bootcamp & Hyper-Growth Programs: You begin with a 50% profit share. After your first successful account scale-up, this increases to 75% and can eventually reach 100%.
• High Stakes Program: This premium program starts traders with a generous 80% profit split, which also has the potential to be scaled up to 100%.

The5%ers Payout Schedule

To ensure traders have consistent access to their earnings, all profits can be withdrawn on a regular bi-weekly (every 14 days) schedule.

How The5%ers Scaling Plan Works

The scaling plan is a core feature designed to grow your account exponentially. By reaching specific profit milestones, traders can double their account capital and progressively increase their profit share.

For a complete breakdown of the specific targets and milestones required for each program, you can refer to the official documentation on The 5%ers' help center.

Maximum Position Size

To maintain proper risk control, the following maximum lot sizes per order are enforced:

• FX & Indices: 50 lots
• XAU/USD (Gold): 20 lots

Independent Evaluation Principle

Each trading evaluation you undertake must be traded and completed independently. Your strategies and performance must be unique to each specific evaluation account.

Server and Order Limits

To ensure system stability for all traders, the following limits are in place:

• Simultaneous Orders: You can have a maximum of 100 open orders at one time.
• Daily Modifications: You can make up to 2,000 modifications (e.g., TP/SL adjustments) per day.
• Daily Position Limit: A maximum of 2,000 total positions may be opened per day.

Risk Management Policy 🛡️

You are prohibited from risking your entire account balance on a single trade. Trading styles deemed excessively risky or indicative of gambling are a violation of our terms and will lead to account termination with a full refund.

Multi-Account Hedging Prohibition

Executing hedging strategies across multiple accounts is strictly forbidden, even if all accounts belong to the same trader.

Comprehensive Copy Trading Rules

Trade copying is allowed but is subject to strict conditions to ensure our independent evaluation principle is met.

• Allowed ✅: You can copy trades between your own accounts. For example, you can copy from a personal master account to your funded E8 Trader account.
• Prohibited ❌: You are strictly forbidden from copying trades (manually or with EAs) between multiple E8 evaluation accounts. Each evaluation must be traded uniquely.

Minimum Trade Duration (Anti-Scalping)

To prevent high-frequency scalping strategies, you cannot have more than 50% of your total trades last for a duration of less than one minute.

Discretionary Risk Limits

If prohibited trading practices are detected, the firm reserves the right to de-risk your strategy by enforcing a maximum risk exposure of no more than 2% per trade idea or time horizon.

Expert Advisor (EA) Policy 🤖

The use of Expert Advisors (EAs) is permitted, but your trading strategy must be unique. We limit one distinct strategy per user. If our system detects multiple users executing identical trades with the same third-party EA, it will be flagged as a violation, which may lead to account termination. We recommend using your own proprietary EA.

News Trading Rules 📰

The rules for trading during high-impact news events differ based on your account stage:

• Evaluation Accounts: News trading is fully permitted.
• Funded Accounts: Trading is prohibited within the window of 5 minutes before to 5 minutes after a high-impact news release.

Signature Program: Trading Hours

For traders in the Signature Program, holding positions overnight or over the weekend is not allowed. All positions must be closed before the market closes on Friday.

Account Inactivity Policy

An account will be automatically disabled after 60 consecutive days of inactivity (no new trades placed). Once an account is disabled, there is no entitlement to a refund.

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Our In-Depth FundedNext Review (Updated August 2025)

Welcome to our comprehensive FundedNext review. If you're weighing your options in the world of proprietary trading, understanding the specific FundedNext rules is crucial. In this guide, we break down everything from their copy trading policy to news trading restrictions, answer common questions from the FundedNext FAQ, and provide the clarity you need to determine if this firm is the right fit for your strategy.

Key Trading Rules and Conditions

FundedNext has established a unique set of guidelines that offer flexibility in some areas while maintaining strict protocols in others.

Consistency Rule: A Major Advantage

One of FundedNext's most appealing features is its approach to consistency. Unlike many prop firms, FundedNext has no consistency rule for its main programs. This allows traders to operate with significant freedom, knowing that a single highly profitable day won't jeopardize their payout eligibility.

Copy Trading Policy

The FundedNext rules on copy trading are very specific and must be followed precisely to avoid account violations.

• Permitted Use: Copy trading is only allowed between your own FundedNext Challenge accounts. It is strictly prohibited during the funded account phase.

• Capital Limit: The total combined capital across all accounts involved in copy trading must not exceed $300,000.

• Allowed Technology: Only VPS-based copiers are permitted. The use of third-party, cloud-based services like Social Trader Tools or Duplikum is forbidden.

• No External Copying: You cannot copy trades between a FundedNext account and any external account (from other prop firms or personal brokers).

Expert Advisor (EA) Guidelines

FundedNext is EA-friendly, but with important conditions to ensure unique trading activity.

• Platform Support: EAs are supported on MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5.

• Unique Strategy Required: Your EA's strategy must be customized to your personal trading style. If your EA produces identical trades as other users on the platform, it will be flagged as a violation.

• No Strategy Switching: You must stick with your chosen method (EA or manual trading) throughout both the Challenge and Funded Account phases.

News Trading Regulations

The rules for trading during high-impact news events are quite trader-friendly for most accounts.

• Permitted Accounts: Trading during news is allowed for Stellar Instant, Stellar, and Stellar Lite accounts.

• Profit Restriction: A specific restriction applies where profits from trades executed within the window of 5 minutes before to 5 minutes after a high-impact news event are subject to a 40% news profit split rule.

FundedNext FAQ: Answering Your Questions

Here are answers to some of the most common questions we see in the FundedNext FAQ and on forums like Reddit.

What are the minimum trading days?

The requirement varies by challenge model:

• Stellar Lite & Stellar 2-Step: 5 trading days.

• Stellar 1-Step: 2 trading days.

• Stellar Instant & Funded Accounts: No minimum trading day requirement.

Is there an inactivity rule?

Yes. To keep your account active, you must log in or execute at least one trade within any 35-day period.

Other Critical FundedNext Rules

Beyond the main policies, several key rules govern trading conduct and risk management.

• Consistent Strategy: Your trading style, including strategy, risk per trade, and asset classes, must remain consistent between the challenge phase and your funded account.

• Risk Management: For traders flagged for risky behavior, a maximum risk of 1% per trade across all positions is enforced. Violations can lead to account termination.

• Single Device/IP: It is strongly recommended to use a single device and a unique IP address to avoid security flags or complications.

• "Account Rolling" Prohibited: Buying multiple evaluation accounts with the intent of using high-risk, luck-based strategies to pass one while sacrificing others is strictly forbidden and may lead to a permanent ban.

Key Trading Rules and Conditions

The following outlines the key trading rules for the OANDA Prop Trader program. Adhering to these guidelines is essential for all participants.

Expert Advisors (EAs)

The use of Expert Advisors (EAs), custom scripts, and indicators is generally permitted. However, any EA designed to engage in prohibited strategies, such as price or latency arbitrage, is strictly forbidden and will violate the terms and conditions.

News Trading Restrictions

Traders may not manually open or close trades within a 4-minute window (specifically, 2 minutes before and 2 minutes after) of a high-impact news release. Importantly, this restriction does not apply to pre-set Stop Loss or Take Profit orders that are triggered automatically during this period.

Copy Trading Policy

The copy trading rules are specific: You are not permitted to copy trades between multiple OANDA Prop Trader accounts. However, you are permitted to copy trades from your OANDA Prop Trader account to an external, non-OANDA account (e.g., a personal retail account).

Daily Max Profit (Consistency Rule)

A daily max profit rule is in effect only during the two evaluation phases to encourage consistent performance:

• Phase 1: The maximum profit for a single day is capped at 5%.
• Phase 2: The maximum daily profit limit is reduced to 2%.

This rule is completely removed once you are allocated a funded Prop Trading account.

30-Day Inactivity Rule

If an account shows no trading activity for 30 consecutive calendar days, it will be considered a hard breach. The account will be permanently closed and cannot be reinstated.

Minimum Trade Size

The minimum required trade size is 0.1 lots for Forex and Metals, and 1.0 lot for CFD indices.

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"For a quick comparison of these regulations with other firms, please see our main prop firm rules summary page."

Seacrest Funded (Seacrest Markets) Key Trading Rules and Account Guidelines

Seacrest Funded has a specific set of rules designed to promote consistent and responsible trading. Understanding these guidelines is crucial for success in their programs.

News Trading Rules

News trading is permitted during the Challenge Phase but is restricted on Live Simulated Accounts. On live accounts, you are prohibited from opening or closing trades within a 3-minute window (before and after) of high-impact news releases. This is considered a soft breach, resulting only in the removal of profits from the specific trades. Holding existing trades through the news window is allowed.

Minimum Profitable Days Requirement

For 1-step and 2-step evaluations, traders must achieve at least 3 profitable days to pass. A day is classified as profitable if it generates a net profit of 0.5% or more of the initial account balance. Failing to meet this target does not cause a breach but will delay the successful completion of your evaluation.

Policy on EAs and Copy Trading

Seacrest Funded has strict policies regarding automated and copied trading to ensure individual performance.

• Expert Advisors (EAs): EAs are permitted on the MT5 platform only. However, traders must use unique EAs with personalized settings. Duplikium, arbitrage-based bots, and high-frequency trading (HFT) methods are strictly prohibited. All EA activity is closely monitored. Read more
• Copy Trading: You are only allowed to copy trades between your own personal accounts (at Seacrest Funded or other brokers). Copying signals, or trades from friends, family, or other traders is considered prohibited group trading and can result in account closure and profit forfeiture. Read more

Leverage and Risk Limits (Funded Accounts)

On funded accounts, gambling-style trading or using maximum leverage is not permitted. Your total open position size must not exceed a 2% maximum risk of the account balance. A first violation will result in a warning, while a second violation will lead to your account being disabled.

30-Day Inactivity Rule

You must place at least one trade every 30 days to keep your account active. This timer begins from the date of your purchase, not from your first trade.

VPN, VPS, and IP Address Rules

The use of personal VPNs and VPS services is permitted. However, sharing devices or IP addresses with other Seacrest Funded traders is strictly forbidden. Using these tools to bypass rules against copy trading or group trading will result in immediate account termination.

MT5 Client ID (CID) Restriction

A single MT5 Client ID (CID) must not be used to access or trade on multiple Seacrest Funded accounts, regardless of ownership. Using one CID for more than one account will lead to immediate disqualification, closure of all associated accounts, forfeiture of profits, and a permanent ban.

For a complete list of forbidden strategies, please refer to the official documentation. Read more

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