How did you find out about Breakout?
I watched a video from Cryptoface about Breakout posted in the Market Cipher Discord. I was the first person that passed an evaluation from his community. I wish I knew about it earlier but I’m glad I found it through him recently.

In broad terms, what is your trading strategy?
I am a breakout trader at heart. This trading style is at the foundation of my trading journey. I started out many years ago trading Forex and learned to trade using breakout signals until I became confident enough to trade my own setups. I got away from that for a while until I found crypto so making it to Breakout Prop has a special kind of irony and ring to it. I generally like tight stops and am pretty conservative until I’m ahead and then I trade aggressively.

In more detailed terms, what is your favourite setup?
My favorite setups are breakouts of support/resistance. I prefer a mix of scalps and medium swing trades depending on market conditions. I’ve learned throughout the years trading as market conditions change, you may have to adapt your trading style or walk away from the terminal. So I can be flexible.

How frequently do you trade?
If given the choice, I would trade every day. That’s one huge feature about Breakout I like, trading is available 24/7. A bonus for me. The market doesn’t always cooperate but when those situations arise, that’s my “weekend” so to speak.

What is the best piece of trading advice you’ve ever received?
This is a 2 part answer. First is “don’t be afraid to take profits”. A win is a win. We always want a big win, but it’s okay to just take a smaller win, and reset into the next trade with a larger balance. This has helped me tremendously because in my swing trades, I often watch them range halfway to my target and back to entry several times.

The other bit of advice was to regularly withdraw. We tend to stretch our balances as they grow. More equity results in increased trade size and the like. Withdrawing helps me realize the work I’ve put into planning and executing trades truly pays off. I’ve had previous instances of making a string of fabulous trades followed by a string of losing trades and thought to myself, “man I was up this much and I could have just withdrawn some of it and spent it on something nice for the wife.”

What do you find most difficult in trading?
I had to think about this a bit because I could say any number of things and they would be equal in terms of difficulty. The most difficult thing I have encountered with trading across all assets is my ability to find long term targets and not hold the trade through to those distant targets. I’m sure we’ve all experienced doing the right things at the wrong time and vice versa. We didn’t take profits only to see our trade reverse back to the entry or even worse, turn negative. So when I see a number I’m satisfied with, I am compelled to book the profit irrespective of my overall target because I’ve watched so many trades come back. I’ve also missed many extreme profit opportunities because I am risk averse(mostly) and would rather have a bird in hand. That is definitely a battle I struggle with.

How was your experience with the Breakout Evaluation and Breakout Account?
Coming from a FX background I didn’t know what to expect. I had an idea but I have never experienced the thought of trading on Friday night or Saturday afternoon. The platform itself is smooth and intuitive even for someone who doesn’t trade cryptocurrency much. I view the evaluations as risk/capital management. Making 10% isn’t as hard as anyone would think. I’ve often taken many tiny FX micro accounts and 2,3,4x the account in weeks to months. It’s a simple task. Transitioning from evaluation to live funded trading is smooth, nothing really changes. All the parameters are the same as evaluation so there isn’t much to think about. I haven’t experienced any bugs, trade hangups, bad execution or the like. Spreads are tight and I don’t feel front run or lagged in any way. An overall 10/10 experience.

What advice would you give to someone starting their Breakout Evaluation?
Take it slow but don’t be afraid to go for it with a high-confidence setup. There are no time limits or weird consistency rules so you can hit a home run or pass with a great on-base percentage. I’d recommend smaller position sizes until you are familiar with the interface. If you’re experienced as a trader, be aggressive within the rule set. As I said earlier I view the evaluations as a means of risk/capital management. If you’re going for a 5k account or a 100k account, your evaluation is roughly (+/-)1/100th of the live account balance you trade with when you pass. So take it slow, be methodical and don’t breach, the reward is a funded account where you can access trade power without risking the entire amount of your own personal funds.

Would you recommend Breakout to other traders?
Absolutely. Going back to our first question and answer, I wish I found out about Breakout earlier. I’m going to have to grow to a point where I’m comfortable depositing large sums of money into an exchange and trading with say for example $100,000. That’s a significant amount of money even for most people who are well to do. I’m just not at that point yet, so Breakout is perfect for me or anyone similarly situated. For anyone looking to access trading with that much capital Breakout bridges that gap and acts as a stand-in to reduce or hedge that deposit risk to an exchange. For me that’s a near infinite value and my total potential losses are limited to my evaluation. It’s a great opportunity for anyone starting their journey into trading as a hobby, side gig, or as a career.