Career & the Capital Cycle

This section is about the long game , how a trader progresses from the free Open tier to a funded career, and exactly how the monthly capital cycle works, including settlement and the automatic deposit of your profit share.

5.1 Reading your Rating in depth

Your Rating is your progression score , the thing that unlocks tiers (2.2). It is earned mainly by competing , the way a chess rating is , and is nudged a little by how well you trade.

What moves it up , mostly Rooms, a little trading:

• Room competition (the main driver). After each Room closes, your Rating moves on where you placed against the strength of the field , beat higher-rated traders and you gain more. Bigger, longer Room formats move it far more than quick ones, and when you are new your results count extra so you reach your true level quickly. Only your first few Rooms each day carry full weight.
• Your trading results (a smaller pull). Each funded cycle, if your Meritix Quality Score beats what is expected for your Rating, your Rating ticks up a little (and eases down if it falls short), plus a tiny daily nudge. Helpfully, the disciplined habits that raise this , controlled risk, consistency, profit spread across many trades , are the same habits that earn a high Meritix Quality Score, even though the two are computed separately.

What drags it down: losing to lower-rated fields in Rooms, trading quality below your Rating level, serious integrity violations (which carry a penalty), and long inactivity (which slowly decays your Rating after a grace period, though never below your current tier floor).

Your dashboard shows your current Rating and how it's trending, so you always know where you stand relative to the next tier.

5.2 Qualifying for the next tier

Moving up is how you unlock larger funded capital and better terms. There are two levers, and they work together:

Rating-based qualification. As your Rating climbs, you become eligible for higher tiers. This is the merit path , you earn your way up by trading well. The Rating thresholds rise with each tier (Junior ≥ 1400 plus 3 closed trades, Pro ≥ 1800, Elite ≥ 2200, Master ≥ 2700, Legend ≥ 3300), and the higher tiers also require a sustained Quality Score (Q) and competitive placements , the full criteria are in 10.2.

• Membership claims the seat. Qualifying makes you eligible; your monthly

membership fee claims the seat at that tier. The most common first step is Junior at $49.95/mo, which begins your funded-tier career (requires Rating ≥ 1400 and 3 closed trades , no Rooms needed for Junior).

Upgrading to Junior , what changes: you move from the free Open tier (test-drive account, non-withdrawable PnL) to a funded tier. Now your account is genuinely funded ($25K to start, growing to $50K , see the growth mechanic in 5.4), and your trading produces consistent, withdrawable monthly payouts, settled at the end of each capital cycle. This is the shift from "earning per Session or per Room" to "earning an ongoing trading income."

Higher tiers , Pro, Elite, Master, and the earned Legend tier , unlock progressively larger funded capital (up to $5M-$10M at Legend) and require correspondingly higher Rating, sustained Quality, and competitive results.

5.3 The capital cycle and monthly settlement (in detail)

This is the core mechanic of a funded-tier career, so it's worth understanding precisely.

What a capital cycle is

When you hold a funded tier, your account runs in monthly capital cycles. A cycle is the period , aligned to the platform calendar month , over which your trading is measured and your profit share is settled. Throughout the cycle you trade your funded account normally; at the end of the cycle, The Desk settles up.

What happens at settlement (end of cycle)

At the close of each capital cycle (on the platform's month-end schedule), The Desk processes your account as follows:

1. Your cycle profit is measured. Your cycle profit is simply your

cycle-end balance minus your cycle-start balance , the net change in your funded account's balance over the month.

1. Your Meritix Quality Score sets your share. The 23-metric Meritix Quality

Score (2.4) for the cycle determines what fraction of that profit you keep. Trade with high quality and you keep a large share , up to 100%; trade with low quality and your share is reduced accordingly.

1. Your share is deposited to your Wallet automatically , as withdrawable cash.

You don't have to claim it. At settlement, your quality-scored share of the cycle's profit is automatically credited to your Wallet as withdrawable funds (subject to KYC before withdrawal, see Section 6).

1. The profit is drawn from the funded account. Because the funded account is the

house's capital, the profit you earned is settled out of it , your share goes to your Wallet, and the account is squared up for the next cycle.

1. The account resets clean for the next cycle. Your account's drawdown and

cycle metrics reset to a fresh baseline so the new cycle starts clean , a new month, a new measurement window. (Internally this is a "reset" settlement: the account's running drawdown is zeroed to a fresh baseline as the new cycle begins.)

Renewal and scaling

If you continue on your funded tier into the next cycle (renewal), two things happen in addition to settlement:

• Your metrics reset for the fresh cycle (drawdown, cycle counters), so each

month is measured on its own.

• Your funded capital can scale up as you sustain quality and your Rating

supports it , the account grows over successive cycles, moving you up the capital ladder.

If you do not renew, your earned profit share for the just-completed cycle is still settled and deposited , you keep what you fairly earned , but the account does not roll into a new funded cycle.

What settlement is NOT

• It is not a clawback of your withdrawable Wallet balance. Settlement moves

this cycle's profit share into your Wallet; money already in your Wallet is yours.

• A losing cycle does not create a debt you owe. The funded capital is the

house's; you are not personally liable for trading losses on it. A losing cycle simply means no positive profit share for that cycle.

5.4 Scaling your funded capital , the growth mechanic

The Desk is designed as a ladder, not a ceiling, and the scaling is automatic and predictable, not discretionary.

The growth mechanic: while you maintain your membership and your Rating holds the tier's threshold, your funded capital grows by 10% of the tier floor every month , automatically, with no requalification. Every tier reaches its ceiling in exactly 10 months of sustained Rating:

• Junior: $25K, +$2,500/month → $50K
• Pro: $100K, +$10,000/month → $200K
• Elite: $250K, +$25,000/month → $500K
• Master: $1M, +$100,000/month → $2M

So scaling isn't something you have to chase , as long as you sustain your Rating and stay a member, your capital grows on a fixed monthly schedule. Combined with higher tiers (which you unlock as your Rating climbs), the path runs from the free $10,000 qualification account all the way up to the $5M-$10M Legend tier.

Because your monthly profit share is a percentage of cycle profit, growing capital means the same quality of trading produces larger absolute payouts over time , the compounding that makes a funded career worthwhile.

5.5 Strategy: how to progress efficiently

A few principles that compound in your favor across both Quality Scores and your Rating:

• Protect drawdown above all. It is the hard line in session scoring and a heavy

factor in Meritix. Controlling it protects both your payouts and your Rating.

• Spread your profit. Don't let one trade or one symbol dominate , concentration

is penalized in both scores.

• Size sanely. Oversized exposure hurts the Risk & Sizing family and the session

exposure factor.

• Trade enough, consistently. Thin, one-click samples score poorly; sustained,

real activity scores well.

• Behave well after losses. The Meritix behavioral family rewards composure ,

avoiding tilt and revenge trading literally raises your score.

Do these consistently and three things rise together: your session shares, your monthly funded-tier share, and your Rating , which pulls you up the tiers.