City Traders Imperium vs Aqua Futures

Drawdown, the rule that ends most accounts

CTI runs a Balance-based drawdown and Aqua runs EOD.

Trailing means the limit rises with your equity peak, open positions included: giving profit back can end the account even without a real loss. EOD only recalculates at the session close, which forgives intraday swings.

In practice that is -5% / -10% of room at CTI and $1K-$3.5K trail at Aqua.

What entry really costs

The cheapest entry is CTI, from $24.65 with the coupon applied at checkout, against $49.00 at Aqua.

The discount differs too: 15% OFF at CTI and 40% OFF at Aqua.

CTI / Aqua charges no activation fee, so the price you see is the full cost up to the funded account.

When the money leaves

On the split, CTI pays 100% and Aqua pays 100% up to $15K / 90%.

Aqua allows a payout from the first profitable day, which shortens the path between passing and getting paid.

Declared speed: 14 days at CTI and 24 hours at Aqua.

The rules that kill the account

CTI has no consistency requirement, so one strong day counts in full.

Aqua has no consistency requirement, so one strong day counts in full.

Minimum trading days: 3 at CTI and 1 at Aqua.

CTI explicitly bans: HFT, Latency arbitrage, Hedging between accounts.

Aqua explicitly bans: Gambling behavior, Account exploitation, HFT scalping bots.

Which one fits you

If the goal is testing the model on the smallest possible budget, CTI has the cheaper entry.

If reputation matters more than price, CTI is rated 4.2 on Trustpilot.

Platforms: CTI runs on Match-Trader; Aqua, on Tradovate, DeepCharts, Volumetrica. A strategy tied to one platform decides this on its own.

There is no better firm in the abstract: there is the one that matches your drawdown, your trading hours and how fast you need to withdraw.