Trading rules? We've got answers.
All 20 approved trading rules, qualification requirements, and account-specific limits from one canonical source.
General enforcement rule
Any violation of a trading rule listed here terminates the account immediately. The system does not merely reject the trade or order. Minimum Profitable Days and the Instant Profit Consistency Rule are qualification or payout requirements, so failing them blocks passing or payout without terminating the account.
Daily limits and trade counts use the trading platform's server day, not the trader's device time. Loss calculations use both balance and equity and include closed losses, floating losses, commissions, swaps, and all other trading costs.
One-Step
10% target · 3 Profitable Days
News trading and weekend holding allowed
Two-Step
Phase 1: 5% · Phase 2: 8% · 3 Profitable Days per phase
News trading and weekend holding allowed
Instant
No qualification target · 3 Profitable Days per payout cycle
High-impact news and weekend holding restricted
All account types
The account's daily loss must not reach 5% of the initial account balance. The calculation includes closed-trade losses, floating losses, commissions, swaps, and all other trading costs. Reaching the limit through equity is a violation even if the market later reverses and the position recovers.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
The account's total loss must not reach 10%. The drawdown is fixed for One-Step and Two-Step accounts and trailing for Instant accounts, according to the approved trailing-drawdown method for that account.
Publication note: The exact Instant trailing-drawdown formula must be approved before automated enforcement is activated for that calculation.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
Any strategy that relies on exploiting the platform, execution system, or pricing errors instead of normal market trading is prohibited.
- Arbitrage or latency arbitrage
- High-frequency trading (HFT) or an abnormal number of orders sent at very high speed
- Exploiting execution delays, abnormal spreads, pricing errors, server errors, or platform errors
- Order manipulation or any method designed to bypass technical rules or platform restrictions
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
The account is for the registered trader only. Login details may not be shared, another person may not trade on the account, and copy trading or coordinated matching trades between unrelated traders may not be used to bypass the rules.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
Opening opposite or correlated positions across two or more accounts to guarantee an outcome or bypass loss limits is prohibited, whether the accounts belong to the same person or to cooperating traders.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
Personal Expert Advisors (EAs) and risk-management tools are allowed, provided they do not use a prohibited strategy, exploit a pricing or technical error, or operate as an unauthorized copy-trading or coordinated-trading system.
The account is terminated immediately when a tool is used in a prohibited way.
Instant accounts only
On Instant accounts, traders may not repeatedly increase lot size after losses, or create a sequence or grid of positions intended to average down, recover losses, or wait for the market to return.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
A maximum of two positions may be open on the same instrument at the same time, regardless of direction or lot size. Attempting to open a third position before one of the existing positions is fully closed is a violation.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
One-Step and Two-Step: 4 open positions · Instant: 3 open positions
All open positions on the account are counted, regardless of instrument. Opening a position that exceeds the permitted limit is a violation; the system does not merely reject the order and allow the account to continue.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
A valid Stop Loss must be placed on every position within 60 seconds of entry and must remain active for the entire life of the position. Removing the Stop Loss or leaving a position without one for more than 60 seconds is a violation.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
Every pending order must include a valid Stop Loss from the moment the order is created. Creating a pending order without a Stop Loss, or removing the Stop Loss before the order is triggered, is prohibited.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
One-Step and Two-Step: 12 trades per day · Instant: 8 trades per day
Every newly executed order counts as one daily trade, whether it is later closed or remains open. A triggered pending order counts as a trade. Modifying a position or partially closing it does not count as a new trade. Executing a trade above the daily limit is a violation.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
Each One-Step and Two-Step phase, and each Instant payout cycle
The trader must complete at least 3 Profitable Days. A day qualifies only when the account earns net profit equal to at least 0.5% of the initial account balance after losses, commissions, swaps, and all other trading costs. The Profitable Days do not have to be consecutive.
The account is not terminated, but the challenge cannot be passed and an Instant payout cannot be requested until the requirement is completed.
All account types
Every position must remain open for at least 3 full minutes before any full or partial manual closure. Automatic closure through Stop Loss or Take Profit is allowed before 3 minutes. A manual full or partial closure before the minimum duration is a violation.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
The lot size of a new trade may not exceed twice the average lot size of the trader's last 5 closed trades on the same instrument. If there are fewer than 5 previous trades on that instrument, the maximum lot size in the official account-size table applies.
The account is terminated immediately upon violation.
All account types
Each account size and asset class has a maximum lot limit under the official maximum-lot table. Total open lot size on the same instrument is combined. Any trade or group of open trades above the approved limit is a violation.
Publication note: The official maximum-lot table for every account size and instrument must be approved before this rule is activated.
Once activated with the approved table, a violation terminates the account immediately.
All account types trading US30, NAS100, SPX500, or a similar U.S. index
Opening a new position or triggering a pending order is prohibited during the first 5 minutes after the official U.S. cash-market open. Positions opened before the market open may be closed during this period.
Publication note: The platform clock is configured as IC Markets GMT+2/GMT+3 broker time. The DST-safe mapping to the official U.S. cash-market open must be approved before this rule is activated.
Opening or triggering a position during the restricted period terminates the account immediately.
Instant accounts only
Opening a new position or manually closing a position is prohibited from 5 minutes before until 5 minutes after a high-impact news release on instruments affected by that event. Positions opened before the window may remain open, and automatic closure by Stop Loss or Take Profit is allowed. News trading remains allowed on One-Step and Two-Step accounts.
Publication note: The official high-impact-news calendar or data source must be approved before this rule is activated.
The Instant account is terminated immediately upon violation.
Instant accounts only
All open positions must be closed and all pending orders must be cancelled at least 30 minutes before the weekly market close. Weekend holding remains allowed on One-Step and Two-Step accounts.
The Instant account is terminated immediately upon violation.
Instant accounts only
When requesting a payout, profit from the best trading day must not exceed 40% of the total net profit generated during the current payout cycle. If it is above 40%, the trader must continue trading until it falls to 40% or lower.
The account is not terminated and profits are not cancelled, but payout is unavailable until the requirement is met.