Top One Trader

GENERAL RULES

News Trading Rule

• Evaluation: Allowed
• Funded/Instant Funding: Prohibited to execute (pending orders including market orders, stop loss or take profit orders) or close any trade within 5 minutes before and after high impact news event. Violation results to profit deduction except the trade was open 5 hours prior to the news event.
• Instant Prime allows news trading with an add-on.

Expert Advisors (EAs)

• EAs are allowed only on 1-step-FLASH, 2-step-Pro and 2-step-Plus challenge accounts, not on funded accounts.
• Traders must customize EA settings to match their own style, cannot hide EA usage, and cannot use commercially available automated EAs.

External API Usage Rule

• Prohibited on all Simulated Funded Accounts.
• All third-party tools, applications, or services requiring API access (including read-only) are disabled such as analytics platforms, journaling tools, automation software, and trade copiers.
• The policy applies universally with no exceptions to ensure fairness and long-term sustainability for the firm and traders.

Copy Trading

• Allowed: Manual copy trading only between your own challenge accounts (1-step, 2-step Pro and 2-step Plus) on TradeLocker or cTrader.
• Prohibited:
  • No copy trading on funded or instant funded accounts.
  • No copying between different users.
  • If you have multiple funded accounts, identical trades must be at least 30 minutes apart to avoid being flagged.
  • Violation results to Account review, if confirmed, account may be reset or closed depending on the severity of the issue.
• See details: Is copy trading allowed at Top One Trader?.

Weekend Trading/Holding

• Allowed on 1-step-flash, 2-step-pro and 2-step Plus accounts, (For Instant Funding Not Allowed except with the add-on)
• Crypto trading is allowed over the weekend, but only if the trades are opened after Friday 8 PM EST.

Inactivity Rule

There's a 30-day inactivity rule. You must place at least one trade every 30 days (counting from account purchase date, not from first trade date) to avoid an account breach due to inactivity.

Stop Loss Rule

You must have an active Stop Loss in place at all times when entering a trade.

Soft Breach

There is no limit on the allowed soft breaches for 1-step-flash and or 2-step-pro accounts, with a limit of 4 soft breaches on the 2-step Plus accounts and a limit of 10 soft breaches on the Instant Funding Models. Any Soft breach beyond these limits becomes a hard breach.

Soft Breach Violation

• Violating the 10 minutes news restriction window
• Weekend Holding
• Opening a trade without a stop-loss unless an Add-on is purchased
• Allowing more than a 2% loss per symbol on open trades or a 2.5% loss on all open trades. Should this happen, EquityShield will protect your account by automatically closing trades in most cases
• Funded Accounts have a 20% open lot size limit based on the account size, therefore if the total lots placed exceed the max lots, all open trades will be closed. see lot size restrictions details: https://help.toponetrader.com/en/articles/8318242-are-there-any-lot-size-restrictions

Minimum Hold Time Rule for Trades

All profitable trades must be held for at least 5 minutes before being closed. Closing a profitable trade in less than 5 minutes whether manually, by take profit, or by a stop loss (if set in profit), violates the rule.

Consequences

During Challenge Phases: Violations are reviewed by the Risk Team. Depending on severity, traders may be required to retake the challenge or receive a formal warning. On Funded Accounts: Profits from non-compliant trades are deducted, and traders receive a warning. Repeated violations can result in account termination.

Prohibited Trading Practices

High Frequency Trading (HFT), Tick Scalping, Latency Trading, Latency Arbitrage, Arbitrage Trading, Copy Trading (between accounts not owned by the same person), Group Trading, Hedging or Group Hedging Across Multiple Accounts, News Trading on Funded Accounts, Grid Trading, Martingale Strategy, 3rd Party Trading or Pass Your Challenge Programs, Masking of Expert Advisors (EAs), Gambling, Over-Leveraging, YOLO Trading, IP Address Sharing or Multiple IP Use Across Accounts, Rolling/Churning of Accounts.

EquityShield

Automatic Risk Management Tool: https://help.toponetrader.com/en/articles/9181278-what-is-the-equityshield

IP / VPN / VPS Policy

• Violations Include:
  • Using multiple IPs for one account.
  • Trading multiple accounts from the same/similar IPs.
  • Copying or hedging trades across different accounts or firms.
• VPS Usage: Allowed — must have a static IP and be used responsibly. Notify support if changing or traveling.
• VPN Usage: Strictly prohibited — using a VPN can trigger security flags and lead to account breaches or suspension.
• cTrader Restriction: U.S. IP logins are automatically hard breached with no refunds.
• Penalties: Any violations may result in account breach, profit forfeiture, blacklisting, and potential legal action.
• See Details: https://help.toponetrader.com/en/articles/8733438-are-there-ip-address-restrictions

---

INSTANT FUNDING

Minimum Trading days:

No minimum trading days.

Consistency Rule:

15% consistency score, no single trading day's profit can exceed 15% of total profits during payout. $5k - $100k Accounts purchased before September 24, 2025, will maintain a 20% consistency score.

Locked Upon Payout Rule:

In Instant Funded Accounts, when you request a payout, your maximum trailing drawdown will lock in at the starting balance. From the moment you make a payout, the drawdown no longer trails with your account growth, regardless of how much you continue to grow your account. See details: https://help.toponetrader.com/en/articles/9929762-lock-upon-payout-instant-funding

---

INSTANT PRIME

Minimum Trading days:

No minimum trading days.

Equity Stability Score

At the time of payout request, your ESS must be 20% or lower. If your ESS score is not 20% yet, you will continue trading until you get the score to 20% or lower. Formula: (Largest Winning Day + Largest Losing Day [absolute]) ÷ Total Profit × 100%. See Details: https://help.toponetrader.com/en/articles/12276972-understanding-the-20-equity-stability-score-ess-instant-prime-accounts

Lock Upon Payout Rule

When you request a payout, your maximum trailing drawdown will lock at your initial account balance. From this point on, no matter how much you grow the account, your drawdown stays fixed at your initial account balance.

---

1 STEP FLASH

Minimum Trading Days

Evaluation & Funded: At least 3 profitable days with at least 0.5% net profit of the initial account balance each day.

Locked Upon Payout Rule

When you request a payout, your maximum trailing drawdown will lock at your initial account balance. From this point on, no matter how much you grow the account, your drawdown stays fixed at your initial account balance. See details: https://help.toponetrader.com/en/articles/9117415-how-payouts-impact-drawdown-on-1-step-flash-accounts

2 STEP PRO

Minimum Trading days

No minimum trading days.

Consistency rule

In Phase 1 and Phase 2, no single trading day's profit can exceed 50% of total profits. Once a trader reaches a funded account, the consistency rule adjusts to 30%. To qualify for a payout, no single day's profit can exceed 30% of total accumulated profits.

2 STEP PLUS

Minimum Trading Days

Evaluation & Funded: At least 5 profitable days with at least 0.5% net profit of the initial account balance each day.

Daily Profit Cap - Funded Accounts Only

The daily profit limit is 5% of the funded starting balance, calculated on closed profits for each trading day (resetting at 5:00 PM EST). If the 5% limit is exceeded on any trading day, a soft breach occurs, automatically closing the violating trade(s). Any profit above the allowed 5% is considered invalid

Max Open Risk Rule (Equity Shield)

Equity Shield per Symbol: If the floating loss on a single symbol reaches 1% of starting balance, all open trades on that symbol will, in most cases, be automatically closed. Applies to one symbol, even if multiple positions are open.

Equity Shield on Combined Risk: If combined floating drawdown reaches 1.1% of starting balance, all open trades across all symbols will, in most cases, be automatically closed. Applies to total floating loss across all symbols.

* These actions are classified as a soft breach

Trading may resume immediately after the closure