A-Book vs B-Book Execution

0 of the 30 firms with structured programme data in our dataset publish their execution model in structured form, as of 13 September 2026. All 30 sell the same thing at the front door: a simulated evaluation. What happens behind a funded account, whether the firm holds your risk or passes it to a market, is the question this article answers as far as the disclosures allow, and no further.

Two ways to handle an order

A-book execution passes your order to an external counterparty, a liquidity provider or an exchange, and the firm earns a commission or a spread markup while holding no position against you. B-book execution keeps your order in-house: the firm is your counterparty, your loss is its gain and your gain is its loss. Between the two sits hedging, where the firm internalises order flow and offsets its net exposure externally when the book tilts too far one way. The trade-offs are the same for any prop firm that reaches the point of holding real risk: a B-book earns more in calm conditions and loses when clients win together, while an A-book earns less and cannot be beaten by its own clients ^[1].

Why a simulated evaluation is neither

An evaluation account is a demo account. No order reaches a liquidity provider or an exchange, no firm takes the other side, and the terms A-book and B-book do not apply. The firm's revenue at this stage is the fee: 152 of the 159 programme rows in our dataset bill a one-time fee and 7 bill monthly. The product is the target, the drawdown and the rules, and the firm's money is not at risk until you pass. The execution question opens only on a funded account, and even then it opens slowly, because at the firms that disclose a live tier the funded account starts in simulation too.

What B-book means for a funded trader

A funded account that stays in simulation has no market profit behind it. When you win, no counterparty pays the firm; the firm pays you from its own cash, and that cash comes from fees. This is the structure of the product, and it means the firm carries your risk until it hedges, whether or not it describes itself as a B-book. The risk concentrates when many funded traders win at once, because every payout falls due against the same pool.

The Funded Trader paused all operations on 28 March 2024. Finance Magnates reported just over $2 million in blocked withdrawals in January and February 2024 against $17 million paid, and in August 2024 the firm said it had paid 30 percent of the payouts it owed ^[2]. We do not know that firm's execution model and do not claim to. What the episode shows is what a payout obligation looks like when it outruns cash. Finance Magnates Intelligence counted 80 to 100 prop firm closures in 2024 ^[3].

What A-book costs the firm

Passing risk to a market is not free. An A-book needs a liquidity provider or a clearing broker, margin posted with that counterparty, spreads and commissions paid on every hedged trade, and the compliance load that comes with a regulated venue ^[1]. That is why the firms that have moved in this direction have bought or built the venue rather than rented it. FTMO acquired OANDA from CVC, announced 3 February 2025 and closed 1 December 2025, with the price later shown in FTMO's 2025 filings as CZK 8.79 billion, about $422 million ^[4]. Topstep Brokerage opened a waitlist on 27 January 2026 as a CFTC-registered introducing broker and NFA member with Plus500 clearing ^[5]. Tradeify Brokerage LLC, trading as Slay Markets, launched on 19 May 2026 as a CFTC-registered introducing broker with NinjaTrader clearing ^[6]. Breakout is owned by Kraken, which completed the acquisition on 4 September 2025 ^[7]. Owning a venue tells you the firm has somewhere to send orders. It does not tell you which accounts, or how many, are sent there.

Hybrid in practice

The firms that disclose a live tier describe the same shape: simulated funding first, live capital for a small minority. Topstep reports 0.71 percent reached Live in 2025 ^[8], Tradeify reports 3.0 percent of funded accounts called up to Live Funded between August 2025 and July 2026, and DayTraders.com states about 1 percent of sim-funded traders move to live, at the firm's discretion; see our research on business-model-types for the live tiers in full. Read those figures from the other end: about 97 to 99 percent of funded accounts at the firms that disclose stay in simulation, and the firm carries their payouts. Hybrid, in practice, means the firm holds the risk on almost every account and hedges the few it has chosen to back with live capital.

How to tell

Read the corporate disclosures, because our dataset does not record execution model as a field and no firm we track publishes one in structured form. FTMO owns OANDA. Topstep and Tradeify own CFTC-registered introducing brokers. FXIFY states that its trading side is operated by Prime Intermarket Group Eurasia Ltd in Mauritius, holder of Investment Dealer Licence GB24204066, with FXIFY Solutions Limited in the UK as payment agent ^[9]. DNA Funded is the prop arm of DNA Markets in Australia. Most firms disclose nothing about where a funded order goes, and the absence of a statement is not evidence of a model in either direction.

Three questions cover what can be checked: whether the firm names a broker or venue for funded accounts, whether it publishes the criteria and the rate for moving accounts to live capital, and whether the entity that takes your fee is the entity that owes your payout. Where the answers are missing, write "not disclosed" and weigh the firm on the rules it does publish.

What this means for you

Your evaluation is not A-booked or B-booked. It is a demo, and the fee is the firm's revenue. The execution question only matters once you are funded, and at the three firms that disclose a rate, 97 to 99 percent of funded accounts never leave simulation.

A simulated funded account means your payout comes from the firm's cash. That is not a defect; it is the product. It does mean the firm's ability to pay depends on fee inflow and on how many funded traders win in the same month, and no firm in our dataset publishes the numbers that would let you judge that.

Owning a broker is a disclosure, not a guarantee. FTMO, Topstep, Tradeify and Breakout have named venues; most firms have not. Where a firm says nothing, record "not disclosed" and compare it on the rules, windows and caps it does publish.

Data note

Figures marked "our dataset" come from the PropTraderCheck structured dataset as of 13 September 2026: 30 firms with structured programme data (of 37 tracked), 159 programme rows, 48 programmes. Regulatory positions are stated as of the date given and change.