FTMO vs MFF vs E8 Funding
In this article we’ll be covering our three favorite and most popular prop firms. Full transparency, we partner with these three firms because we have found them to be trustworthy. If you’ve been in the Forex space for a while you may remember the huge scandal that involved a certain prop firm that won’t be named on here – that was both unregulated and was scamming people by taking their challenge fees, giving them “funded” accounts and not paying out on profit splits. Whether or not you want to use a prop firm to get funding, it’s extremely important to vet what firm you’re going to do business with so you can avoid being in a situation where you’ve turned a huge profit on your prop account and get nothing in return for it.
We highly suggest doing your own research and we suggest taking things like the age / launch date of the fund into consideration. This article can be used as a loose guide for comparing prop firms, but again we urge you to check out each of their websites and reading their reviews on Trustpilot before diving into it. With that said, let’s get into the battle between our favorite prop firms… FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding!
What Is A Forex Prop Firm Fund?
Before we dive into it, let us quickly explain what prop firm funding is, how the business model works, and why it may be a good option for you as a trader looking to start their career.
Prop firm funds are a useful way to get access to large amounts of capital without directly managing a relationship with a private investor or funding an account with your own money. This has become an increasingly popular way to trade as a professional forex trader because it takes all of the hard work of attracting investors out of the equation. The only difference is, you’ve got to pass a challenge and verification for most prop firms to prove to them that you can trade consistently and profitably, then they’ll grant you a “funded” prop firm account where you can trade it and if you can turn a profit on the account, they will give you what is known as a “profit split”, a percentage of the profit you’ve made on the account, typically 80%.
The reason I’ve put “funded” in quotations is because most prop firms actually just provide you with demo accounts to trade, meaning you’re not actually managing a real account. But if you ask me, this doesn’t matter so long as they pay you your profit split. The way the model works is that the prop firm charges users a fee for a challenge account, which they can get back so long as they pass the challenge, verification, and are able to make it to a profit split.
Prop firms make money in two ways generally. One is by collecting and keeping challenge fees from traders who fail their challenges/verifications, and two is by routing their profitable trader’s trades to a live account so they can profit off of their winning trades, thus covering the cost of profit splits.
Once you understand how the prop firm model works, you’ll realize that despite what a lot of people say, it’s not scammy or predatory. At least in my opinion, you risk say $650 – $800 USD for the opportunity to secure a $100,000 USD “funded” account that you can trade with. Sure it’s not easy to secure funding with the time limits and added psychological pressure, nor is it easy to keep an account when funded, but ideally you should only be going for funding when you’ve proven in a small live or a trial account that you’re capable of hitting the profit targets within the time constraints.
Compare that to funding an account with your own money, and potentially losing way more than $500-$1,000. Your downside risk is very limited, but the challege is that you are put up against constraints and rules that cause most traders to fail… unless they have a good strategy, trading psychology, and processes to make it to the other side, and keep that account!
Prop Firm Programs Comparison
With that out of the way let’s dig into the most popular programs that most traders go through for FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding. If you want more details on the alternate programs that each prop firm offers, we urge you to check out their websites.
| Funding Programs | FTMO Programs | MyForexFunds Programs | E8 Funding Programs |
| Instant Funding | ❌ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Two-Phase Funding | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
As outlined in the chart above, you’ll see that of the three prop firms, only MyForexFunds offers “instant funding”, where you can purchase an account (at a high premium) without going through the challenge and verification phases before receiving funding.
It should be noted, that while it’s a cool program to offer, we expect that something like 80%+ traders will go for two phase funding programs anyways, since they’re way cheaper, and the accounts are much larger in capital. Not only that, but from a trader’s perspective it’s good to practice getting used to the rules and completing a challenge and verification to build confidence in yourself and your trading abilities!
Prop Firm Profit Split Comparison
| Profit Split | FTMO Profit Split | MyForexFunds Profit Split | E8 Funding Profit Split |
| Starting Profit Split | 80% | 75% | 80% |
| Max Profit Split | 90% | 85% | 80% |
Next let’s compare the profit-splits that FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding offer. When it comes to profit splits, there isn’t a huge difference, but FTMO definitely offers the best profit share (starting and within their scaling plan) among the three prop firms.
Prop Firm Accounts, Fees, & Leverage Comparison
Now let’s compare the most common program’s (two phase evaluation accounts) account sizes, fees, commissions, and leverage that FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding offer.
Account Sizes vs Fees
| Account Sizes | FTMO Fee | MyForexFunds Fee | E8 Funding Fee |
| $5,000 | N/A | $49 USD | N/A |
| $10,000 | $162 USD | $84 USD | N/A |
| $20,000 | N/A | $139 USD | N/A |
| $25,000 | $262 USD | N/A | $228 USD |
| $50,000 | $360 USD | $299 USD | $338 USD |
| $100,000 | $564 USD | $499 USD | $588 USD |
| $200,000 | $1,128 USD | $979 USD | N/A |
| $250,000 | N/A | N/A | $988 USD |
As we can see in this comparison, FTMO is a little bit on the more expensive side, but remember they do offer up to 90% profit split with an 80% split to start.
MyForexFunds on the other hand is the best value but their profit split starts at 75% for the first month on their evaluation accounts, then 80% on their second, and 85% on their third and beyond.
Lastly we have E8 Funding which is actually pretty decent value for every account size except for $100,000, which is one of the most popular options. Again with a constant 80% profit split, good value for its $50,000 accounts and under, and the $250,000 is amazing value considering you get a whole $250k funding for less than the price of a $200k FTMO account.
Account Leverage vs Asset Class
| Asset Class | FTMO Leverage | MyForexFunds Leverage | E8 Funding Leverage |
| Major Forex Pairs | 1:100 | 1:100 | 1:100 |
| Minor Forex Pairs | 1:100 | 1:100 | 1:50 |
| Commodities | 1:50 | 1:100 | 1:50 |
| Indices | 1:50 | 1:100 | 1:50 |
| Stocks | 1:10 | N/A | N/A |
| Cryptocurrencies | 1:3 | 1:100 | 1:5 |
Again, keep in mind these comparisons are for two phase evaluation accounts only. Leverage may or may not vary depending on the type of account (swing for FTMO is 1:30 leverage, and MFF’s Rapid and Accelerated programs have different leverage from their standard evaluations accounts too!)
Prop Firm Trading Instruments Comparison
| Asset Class | FTMO Instruments | MyForexFunds Leverage | E8 Funding Leverage |
| Major Forex Pairs | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Minor Forex Pairs | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Commodities | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Indices | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Stocks | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Cryptocurrencies | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
Next let’s compare the different trading instruments that FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding offer. On this one, FTMO is a clear winner because it offers the most diverse range of asset classes to trade, but not by much. The majority of traders trade FX, Indices and Commodities – so unless you only trade Stocks, FTMO is the best option for you.
Prop Firm Platforms & Brokers Comparison
Let’s also compare the different available trading platforms and brokers that FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding offer and utilize.
Available Trading Platforms Comparison
| Trading Platform | FTMO Platforms | MyForexFunds Platforms | E8 Funding Platforms |
| MT4 | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| MT5 | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| C-Trader | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ |
In this category, FTMO reigns king by offering all 3 of the most common platforms that FX traders use ranging from MT4/MT5, and C-Trader. C-Trader is good for who are on Mac and don’t want to fiddle with configuring MT4/MT5, which can sometimes be buggy or tough to get set up right. For the majority of traders however, MT4 is the most common platform used and works just fine despite being antiquated.
Prop Firm Brokers Comparison
| FTMO Platforms | MyForexFunds Platforms | E8 Funding Platforms | |
| Brokers | Tier-1 Liquidity Provider | Traders Global Group | Tier-1 Liquidity Provider |
As for brokers, both FTMO and E8 use Tier-1 Liquidity Providers meaning that their execution times and spreads are fantastic, plus there is rarely slippage with the exception of high impact news events, which are restricted with FTMO anyways.
MyForexFunds on the other hand works with a broker called Traders Global Group, and uses their server for quoting price. It could be argued that execution times, liquidity, spreads, and slippage are worse, but in our experience it’s not something we’ve noticed.
Trustpilot Reviews & Feedback Comparison
| Trading Platform | FTMO Rating | MyForexFunds Rating | E8 Funding Rating |
| Trustpilot Rating | 4.9 ⭐ | 4.9 ⭐ | 4.8 ⭐ |
Finally, let’s compare Trustpilot reviews and ratings for FTMO, MyForexFunds, and E8 Funding to get an idea of what the services and support are like!
In this case, every prop firm is pretty well neck and neck, with both average ratings nearing almost 5 stars, and the actual reviews being very positive overall, which contribute to that rating.
If you ask our opinion, we have traders on the team and in our community that are funded with at least one of the three prop firms we’ve covered today.
FTMO is our favorite because it’s got the best spreads and execution, plus has been around for years.
MFF is a great alternative if you’re looking for a bit of a cheaper option, at the cost of a lower initial and max profit split and potentially poorer execution.
Finally, for E8 Funding, we think this prop firm is a great option for those looking to scale up once they’ve maxed out with a prop firm like FTMO with their pricing for certain packages being such a great value, and their tier-1 liquidity provider making their execution speed and low spreads optimal for trading.
How To Get Funded As A Forex Trader
So you want to get funded, eh? Prop firm funding is the hottest thing since sliced bread in the FX industry. We actually have a few articles on how to get prop firm funding, so we suggest you check them out.
That being said, getting funding is actually a quite simple process on paper. Find a strategy, stick to it, get consistent trading that strategy in a demo account or a small live account, do a challenge or a few challenges until you get funding, then focus on getting consistent returns and profit-splits (also known as payouts).
In practice it’s not that easy. The road map to getting funded as an FX trader is laid out for you, but to complete the first step (getting consistent in your trading) is the hands down hardest part. Why? Because trading ain’t easy, and neither is being consistently profitable. That doesn’t mean it’s impossible of course! The truth is that anyone can learn to trade if they want it bad enough and are willing to put the effort in to become consistent and hone their trading psychology skills in a way that is conducive to long term profitability, but most people jump the gun and go for funding way too early in their trading career.
Pick a system and seek consistency as a trader first! Then pursue funding.
Looking For A Strategy To Help You Secure Funding & Get Profitable?
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Robert Castillo – Currency & Commodities Trader,
Financial Analyst, Writer & Editor.
Robert is a funded trader based out of Toronto, Canada, and has been trading currencies, commodities, stocks, and cryptocurrencies for over 7 years. Outside of trading he enjoys producing music, mixed martial arts, and riding his motorcycle in the summer.
