Evaluation (challenge) account

Pass and fail conditions

An evaluation is a finite game with explicit ending conditions. The trader passes when net profit reaches the target and every secondary condition is satisfied at the same moment: a minimum number of trading days, the consistency rule if the firm applies one during the evaluation, and no drawdown breach on the way. The trader fails on the first breach of the maximum drawdown, of a hard daily loss limit, or of a position or instrument restriction. Some breaches are soft, ending the day rather than the account. A time limit can also end an attempt that has neither passed nor failed.

• The target is usually expressed as a dollar amount or a percentage of the nominal account size.
• The drawdown allowance during the evaluation is typically smaller than the target, which fixes the ratio of reward to permitted loss for the attempt.
• The reset fee buys a fresh attempt on the same product with the balance and drawdown returned to their starting values.

What changes once the evaluation is passed

The rules of the funded stage are a separate set. At many firms the drawdown model differs after funding, the consistency rule appears or disappears, an activation fee becomes due and payout conditions start to apply. Copying the evaluation rules into a funded-stage model without checking is a common way to misjudge an account. Read both sections of the agreement before buying.

In Senzoukria

The Prop firm rules form in the Results space has a section titled Evaluation next to a section titled Funded account, with a Copy the evaluation rules shortcut whose help text warns that the funded phase usually has a different drawdown and a consistency rule that did not exist before. The fields are Profit target, Minimum trading days, Maximum trading days, Maximum contracts, the Maximum drawdown block, the Daily loss limit block, the Consistency rule block and the fees, including Evaluation purchase and Reset. Once rules are saved, the Prop firm simulation counts Evaluations bought, the Evaluation pass rate and Funded accounts across reshuffled orderings of the same trading days, and the card Should I buy this evaluation states whether, under that record, buying would have made sense on the three conditions it prints. Trades without a recorded excursion cannot settle a drawdown rule that follows open profit, and the engine says so rather than assuming.

The scripting sandbox trades a simulated evaluation account on the local machine only; that account never reaches a broker.

Common mistakes

• Judging an evaluation on the equity curve rather than on account survival. A curve that recovers from a deep drawdown still represents a failed attempt if the allowance was breached at the low.
• Counting an attempt that ran out of data as a fail. The Senzoukria simulation leaves such truncated attempts out of the pass rate rather than counting them either way.
• Reading a pass rate from too few sessions. A single good week reshuffled is still a single good week.