The short answer#
Do prop firms use real money? For trading, usually not: at the challenge-based firms most people mean, the account you trade is simulated, before and after you are funded. The prices are real market prices and the payouts are real money, but the balance and your orders are not.
When you profit under the rules and request a payout, the firm sends you actual money from its own funds. Your orders never buy or sell anything on the market.
Does Fullport use real money?
Fullport works this way and says so on the FAQ and in the fill policy. Every fill is computed from a fresh on-chain read of the coin's bonding curve or pool, with the venue fee, a network fee, a 1% platform fee and your own price impact charged to a simulated balance.
No tokens change hands. Payouts are sent in SOL to your wallet.
Are there prop firms that trade real capital?
Yes, under an older meaning of "prop trading firm": a company that trades its own capital through employed or contracted traders, often in an office, under a risk manager. Those firms do use real money, and you do not join them by paying a fee.
If a firm sells you an evaluation online, it is almost certainly the first kind. The prop firm glossary entry covers both meanings.
Why the accounts are simulated#
Look at the ratio between the fee and the account. Fullport's $125,000 account costs $300, which is $2.40 per $1,000 of balance.
Simulation is what lets a $300 fee open a $125,000 balance. The fee is not a deposit against the balance; it is the price of the evaluation.
Simulation solves that. The firm never has $125,000 at risk, because the balance only exists in its ledger. What it does have at risk is the payouts it promises, and those it can bound precisely.
At Fullport the bound is published: an account can pay its trader at most $2,400, $4,800 or $7,200 across three capped payouts, depending on size. That fixed ceiling per account is what makes the payouts affordable and reliable.
| Part | Real or simulated | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Market prices | Real | Read fresh from the coin's curve or pool on Solana at execution |
| Fees and price impact | Real formulas, simulated charge | Venue fee, network fee, 1% platform fee and impact are charged to the simulated balance |
| Account balance | Simulated | $25,000, $50,000 or $125,000 that exists only in the firm's ledger |
| Your orders | Simulated | Nothing is bought or sold on-chain; other traders never see your size |
| Evaluation fee | Real | $120, $195 or $300, paid once; the only money you put in |
| Payouts | Real | 80% of each approved request, sent in SOL to your wallet every 5 days |
Swipe or scroll to compare all columns.
Where the payout money comes from#
From the firm's revenue, which for an evaluation business is mostly fees. Fees from evaluations fund the payouts to traders who reach a funded account.
It is the same structure as any test with a fee and a prize, and why a free funded account that pays is rare. What makes a firm sustainable is fees priced against its maximum payouts, with those maximums written down.
Some firms say they copy successful funded traders onto live accounts, or trade against their flow. That may be true for some, but it does not change your position: you are paid under the payout rules either way.
Unless a firm publishes how and where that happens, treat it as unverifiable marketing rather than a reason to trust it.
A simulation is only as honest as its fills. If a firm prices trades from a delayed chart, profitable trading is easy in the simulation and the firm has to claw it back with surprise rules at payout time. Fills priced from the real market, with real costs, are what make a simulated result meaningful. Ask any firm exactly how its fills are priced.
What it means for your risk#
- Your cost is capped at the fee. Trading losses come out of the simulated balance, never your wallet. At Fullport the one-time fee is $120, $195 or $300.
- You do not need your own trading capital. You do not fund a wallet to trade the account. A Solana wallet is only needed to receive payouts.
- No front-running. Because your orders never reach the chain, nobody can sandwich or front-run them, and there is no tip war to win before you are filled.
- The rules are the contract. Since the firm pays from its own funds, everything depends on the published payout terms: split, cycle, caps and conduct rules.
Is a funded account just a demo?
**A funded account is a scored simulation with a real prize.** Judge it the way you would judge any paid competition: by whether the scoring is honest, the rules are public before you pay, and the prize terms are written down.
How prop firm payouts work walks through the payout side, and what is a crypto prop firm covers the model from the start.
How to check a firm's claims#
- 1
Find the sentence that says simulated
A firm that runs simulated accounts should say so plainly in its rules, terms or FAQ. Vague language about "capital allocation" with no statement either way is a warning sign.
- 2
Read the fill methodology
Look for where prices come from, which fees are charged, and whether your own size moves the price. If there is no fill policy, the simulation is unaccountable.
- 3
Find the payout ceiling
Per-request and per-account caps tell you the firm's maximum liability. A firm that cannot state one is promising something it may not be able to fund.
- 4
Check how payouts are sent
Look for the payout method, network and schedule in the rules themselves. A certificate or a screenshot is not a payout policy.
Fullport answers all four in public: the simulation is stated in the FAQ, fills in the fill policy, caps on the rules page, and payouts go out in SOL to your wallet every 5 days. You practise on live memecoin prices with no wallet needed to trade, from a desktop or your phone, and every fee is on the pricing page.
Quick answers
- Is the balance in a funded prop firm account real money?
- At challenge-based prop firms the funded account balance is usually simulated, not real money, and your trades are not placed on the market. The payouts are real: approved profit is paid from the firm's own funds. At Fullport payouts are sent in SOL.
- Are funded accounts just demo accounts?
- The balance works like a demo, but the rules and the payouts do not. A funded account is scored under a binding rulebook, and profit you make under those rules is paid out in real money. A demo account pays nothing, whatever it shows.
- Do I need my own money to trade a funded account?
- No. At firms that run simulated accounts you trade a simulated balance, so you do not fund a wallet to trade. At Fullport you pay a one-time fee of $120, $195 or $300, and a Solana wallet is only needed to receive payouts.
- Where do prop firms get the money to pay traders?
- Mostly from evaluation fees, which fund payouts to the traders who reach a funded account. Sustainable firms cap what each account can pay out, so their maximum liability is fixed and covered.
- Do any prop trading firms use real capital?
- Yes. Traditional proprietary trading firms trade their own capital through hired traders, usually after interviews rather than a paid challenge. Online firms that sell evaluations generally use simulated accounts and pay real payouts instead.