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Maverick74 and marketsurfer's TopstepTrader Combine (daily trade reports and journal)
- Thread starter TST_Hoag
- Start date
Quote from atticus:
No of course not, but it allows for a lot of subjectivity not accounted for in the combine rules. It's an easy out for Patak/TST.
I would call that blatant and not sure it falls under subjective. It clearly states on their website though that this is a subjective process. FWIW, I know a guy on ET who IS funded and trading LIVE and he was asked to trade a few more days due to some marginal numbers on his performance report. He said they were very fair about the process and open about what they wanted to see. I don't see anything wrong with that.
However, my greater point remains, what good exactly does it do to get funded when in reality you can't trade? I mean seriously, they won't be able to take a check out. They will simply go live, crash and burn and go right back to the combine. They would simply be wasting their time.
It would be analogous to my stealing someone else's resume to get a job interview at Goldman trading structured products when in reality I don't know dick about them. So what good is getting an interview going to do right? As I said before, the purpose of the combine is not to "win" anything. This is not a game at a local carnival where you get a big teddy bear if you shoot 3 ducks down. LOL.
Quote from MichaelPatak:
icarus618- This is not, hit a profit target you win. The Combine has an objective. Meet or exceed the profit target and adhere to the scouting criteria. Each hold the same weight. While you are in the Combine scouts monitor your trading. A big win day followed by scratching trades for the next 9 days does nothing to help you out or show you can handle trading for the long haul on a funded account. Besides being an education and development tool.. the Combine is an interview process so to speak...
mp
Michael, I'm not following you. Maybe I am missing something about the combine rules to get funded. The objective is to meet the profit target of $3500, correct? If a person can do that in a couple of trend AM sessions, what is the problem if he washes to avoid risking the met objective in non trend-AM sessions? You came up with the profit objective and have loss limits in place based on your understanding of how markets operate, right? Well, I'm suggesting a very legitimate strategy based on my understanding of stock index futures. Extracting 14 points per contract ES is a piece of cake when trading only trend days. However, every third day does not set up as a trend day in the stock market.
Are you saying that someone who uses the strategy I suggest and otherwise meets the stated performance requirements would not get funded because of "scouting criteria"? Whatever that means.
Seems like an innovative model to seek out talent for a prop firm, although 30 days is a little slim.
I started fully funded a while back without a track record -- just a weird psych test trying to subtly determine if I thought I could predict the future. Led to a good working relationship for several years but in retrospect that wasn't evidence-based decision making for the firm. This kind of thing is.
Congrats for the innovation to Patak. A solid firm like Bright should take notice of innovative approaches like this, for a small, screened subset. Pairs for all who have $25k does not seem like a useful model. Too one-size-fits-all.
I started fully funded a while back without a track record -- just a weird psych test trying to subtly determine if I thought I could predict the future. Led to a good working relationship for several years but in retrospect that wasn't evidence-based decision making for the firm. This kind of thing is.
Congrats for the innovation to Patak. A solid firm like Bright should take notice of innovative approaches like this, for a small, screened subset. Pairs for all who have $25k does not seem like a useful model. Too one-size-fits-all.
Quote from Maverick74:
I would call that blatant and not sure it falls under subjective. It clearly states on their website though that this is a subjective process. FWIW, I know a guy on ET who IS funded and trading LIVE and he was asked to trade a few more days due to some marginal numbers on his performance report. He said they were very fair about the process and open about what they wanted to see. I don't see anything wrong with that.
However, my greater point remains, what good exactly does it do to get funded when in reality you can't trade? I mean seriously, they won't be able to take a check out. They will simply go live, crash and burn and go right back to the combine. They would simply be wasting their time.
It would be analogous to my stealing someone else's resume to get a job interview at Goldman trading structured products when in reality I don't know dick about them. So what good is getting an interview going to do right? As I said before, the purpose of the combine is not to "win" anything. This is not a game at a local carnival where you get a big teddy bear if you shoot 3 ducks down. LOL.
I agree with all that you state, but it speaks to the business model. It would definitely impact the combine revs for Patak where he to state that you would not be funded in such a scenario.
Patak can be legally held to the rules as stated on the site. Failure to fund a trader on some subjectivity would absolutely be actionable.
Quote from atticus:
I agree with all that you state, but it speaks to the business model. It would definitely impact the combine revs for Patak where he to state that you would not be funded in such a scenario.
Well, I can only tell you what I heard from one of the guys that went through it. He was NOT charged anymore combine fees to trade the additional days so it wasn't a ploy to extract more money. I suspect they do this when you see those performance reports where guys are up and down for 8 days not making any money and then suddenly the last day they go for broke and make it.
Quote from atticus:
Patak can be legally held to the rules as stated on the site. Failure to fund a trader on some subjectivity would absolutely be actionable.
Actually the website does have the disclaimer that the "rules" are used for making the subjective decision. It no where states that anyone is guaranteed funding for simply hitting the numbers.
Quote from Maverick74:
Well, I can only tell you what I heard from one of the guys that went through it. He was NOT charged anymore combine fees to trade the additional days so it wasn't a ploy to extract more money. I suspect they do this when you see those performance reports where guys are up and down for 8 days not making any money and then suddenly the last day they go for broke and make it.
Agreed (again). They're dangling a carrot here and can pull out for any reason and refund the guy should he not meet their subjective criteria. All I am stating is that this is a piss-poor proposition for the trader. You meet their objective, published criteria and then don't get funded. They will be sued, it's just a matter of time.
Carry on.
Quote from Maverick74:
It also defeats the purpose. What is that person suppose to do when they go live? I've tried to make this point before. The goal is not to "win" the combine. The point is to become a consistently profitable trader. Winning does not get you anything. If you go live and lose money, you're going right back to the combine. So what's the point to simply "winning". It reminds me of the college student who spends 4 years cramming for exams where they keep everything in their head for 6 hours and then forget it all. They simply become an uneducated person with a piece of paper that says they are educated. They probably are not going to get too far in life.
Say what??? I went through college cramming for exams and forgetting it all. Am I "uneducated"? LOL.
If not for the possibility of funding, why pay for a combine? To learn how to trade? LOL
No doubt the people profiting from the combine fees would love for that meme to take hold.
A person gets funded by "winning" the combine. If a person pays for a combine and does not get funded, that person has lost. Sure, if he or she has not met the objective criteria, he deserves to lose and has no basis to complain. However, if some subjective criteria is used to deny a person funding, that's not Kosher.