Expected cost to first payout: how this site computes the number

This is the method behind every number the checker prints. If an assumption here is wrong for you, the honest move is to change the input — not to trust a sales page instead.

Step 1 — the rates

Where a firm publishes its own pass and payout figures (Topstep, MyFundedFutures, Take Profit Trader, Earn2Trade), the checker uses them, with the firm, period and denominator printed in your verdict. Everywhere else it uses the FPFX base rates: 14% of buyers reach funded, ~45% of those ever paid, from 300,000+ accounts across ten firms (2024). There is no audited industry rate; FPFX is a technology vendor's dataset, and it is labelled that way wherever it is used.

Step 2 — your declared profile

The base rate is scaled by your declared experience: ×0.5 brand new, ×0.75 irregular demo, ×1.0 steady demo with a written plan, ×1.5 journaled with known numbers — capped at 35%. This is a modelling assumption, printed in the verdict, not a measurement of you and not a promise. It exists because a single flat rate would lie in both directions; the direction of the lie is disclosed either way.

Step 3 — the costs

Expected cost to funded = (fee ÷ funded rate) + activation fee. Attempts are bought one at a time; the activation is paid once, on the passing attempt.
Expected cost to first payout = fee ÷ (funded rate × payout-if-funded rate). This is the average fees paid per buyer who eventually receives a payout — the number with your position in the denominator.
The 90% budget = the number of attempts at which the chance of at least one funded pass reaches 90%: attempts = ln(0.10) ÷ ln(1 − funded rate). At 14%, that is 16 attempts.
Subscriptions (Topstep, Take Profit Trader, Earn2Trade) are modelled as 3-month runs, because the subscription bills until pass, breach or cancel. A faster pass costs less; the assumption is printed so you can re-run it mentally at your own pace.
List prices only. Promotions rot — one tracked evaluation was seen at $13.36 against a $167 list in the same month. A plan built on a promo price is a plan built on weather.

What the method does not do

It does not predict your result, rank firms, or price your time. It prices the door, from the published record, before you pay to walk through it.

Before you pay, take the whole walkthrough

The verdict gives you the expected cost and the rule that applies to you. The Challenge Odds Kit gives you, program by program, the before-you-buy checklist, the style-versus-rules worksheets, the expected-cost workbook, and the payout-protection playbook: how to never hand a firm the excuse to refuse your payout.

Included in the $39 Challenge Odds Kit

See the Challenge Odds Kit

Sources: the firms' own published pages (price grids and program terms), the FPFX Technology dataset of 300,000+ accounts reported by Finance Magnates (2024), pass and payout figures published by the firms themselves, and regulator publications (CFTC, FSMA, Consob, CNMV). Recorded and checked October 22, 2026. Prices on this site are the list prices recorded on that date, promotions excluded; if a price or a rule has moved since, the firm's own page wins — and write to help@doogex.com so we can correct ours.