Ex-FTMO Performance Coach Reveals: The 1 Trait All Funded Traders Share
Former FTMO coach who now runs Telos Capital reveals the single trait that separates funded traders from those who fail. It's not discipline, talent, or patience—it's something more fundamental.
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Pat Bailouni, former FTMO performance coach and founder of Telos Capital, reveals the one trait every funded trader possesses.
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The Discipline & Talent Trap
If you think funded traders succeed because they're more patient, more disciplined, or more talented, you're already focused on the wrong things.
When Pat Bailouni was coaching traders at FTMO, he found one consistent trait that every single funded trader had. Then, when he left FTMO and started his own prop firm (Telos Capital), he found exactly the same trait with all their funded traders.
Critical Reality: Miss this one trait and no strategy, no amount of psychology work, and no risk management rules will save your account. The market will expose you the moment risk goes up, and you're going to crumble.
The 5-Second Check
In less than five minutes, Pat can tell if a trader is going to make it as a funded trader by looking out for this one particular trait. The harsh truth? If you don't have it, the moment risk goes up, the market's going to expose you.
But here's the good news: this trait can be developed, measured, and improved. Stay through this article, and you'll discover exactly what this trait is, how to embody it in your trading, and how it leads to consistent $10,000 monthly payouts from prop firms.
The One Trait: Process Loyalty Under Pressure
The Defining Trait: Every funded trader at FTMO and Telos Capital shares one consistent characteristic: process loyalty under pressure. Funded traders do not negotiate with their system when pressure hits.
What Process Loyalty Actually Means
Funded traders never say to themselves "just this once." They understand that if they do, that bad habit's going to creep in, and if they do it now, they're most likely going to do it again in the future.
Funded traders don't:
- Widen their stops after a loss
- Size up to get it back or make back losses
- Hesitate on valid setups
- Override their processes based on P&L
They remain loyal to the process especially when:
- They're in drawdown
- They've nearly hit their daily loss limits
- They're coming off a winning streak
- They're trading evaluation accounts with tight constraints
- They're getting close to max drawdowns
- They're trading size that actually matters
They maintain loyalty to their process because they know over a large period of time, over a large sample space, being loyal to their process is ultimately what's going to get them payouts.
Why Process Loyalty Trumps Everything Else
Most traders know the rules. Funded traders obey them especially when it hurts most.
Critical Insight: Pressure doesn't create mistakes. It reveals whether loyalty exists. You can use "certainty" as a different word for loyalty. If you have certainty in your processes, in your trading plan, in your execution, in your risk management, then your loyalty increases significantly because you know that's the best option.
Pat shared a recent example from his consulting work:
"I was talking with a trader I'm consulting for recently and we helped him crack a belief system that he has to only take trades he's comfortable with. I questioned him on that. Even trades that are perfectly aligned with your trading plan, there's going to be a level of discomfort. But you have to be willing to embrace both discomfort and comfort in the pursuit of your processes."
Irrespective of how you feel at that point in time, you still need to execute those trades. This is the difference between process loyalty and comfort-seeking.
How Prop Firms Actually Fail Traders
Prop firms don't fail traders on strategy. It's never the strategy that fails a trader. It's always failing traders based on breakdown under pressure.
Think about it: most traders who blow FTMO or other prop firm accounts don't blow them because their strategy is bad. They blow them because they couldn't maintain process loyalty when the pressure was on.
How Process Loyalty Gets You to $10K Per Month
Let's talk about applying this concept to achieve consistent $10,000 monthly payouts from funded accounts.
The Problem of Variability
What Pat observed consistently across traders at Telos Capital and FTMO is that successful traders are removing variability.
Here's how variability works:
You have a central mean—what your trading strategy returns on average. Let's say at the end of a year, your strategy returns 50% on average. That's your mean. That's your true return.
- Over 6 months, your mean would be 25%
- Over 1 quarter (3 months), it's 12.5%
But let's say in the first 3 months, you actually return 25%. There's positive variability—you've got exaggerated returns at the end of the first three months.
The Trap: Most traders will get really elated by this. They think, "I'm going to make even more this year!" They get overconfident. They start increasing their risk. They get sloppy with their execution. They think they know better than the market.
Then the next 3 months, they have an underperforming quarter. Maybe they only make 5% for that whole quarter because they had losing months within it.
There's positive and negative variability—exaggerations and minimizations in your returns. If a trader gets caught in this polarity thinking:
- When in pride (overperforming): They promote greed and find ways to undo their good work
- When in shame (underperforming): They promote fear and beat themselves up
How the Best Traders Remove Variability
The best traders Pat observed can pull consistent $10K per month because they remove variability. They don't get caught into the elations and the depressions.
The Solution: If they've had a good quarter and they're in pride, they know how to regulate themselves. They find the drawbacks and the risks so they don't get too puffed up. They remind themselves: "My edge is 50% per year. I've had an overperforming quarter. Therefore, my next quarter is most likely going to be underperforming."
They have realistic expectations going into the next quarter so they don't get thrown off by a poor performing quarter, and they don't promote greed and fear in their trading. They're more balanced.
When they're down in an underperforming quarter, they find the benefits. They remind themselves of the previous overperforming quarter. They put them together to realize: "I'm going to get my end-of-year mean, which is about 50%."
The Mathematics of $10K Monthly
These traders don't get caught in the swings. They stay balanced and grounded. They know their mean.
Here's how they calculate what they need:
- Know your average monthly percentage return (let's say 5%)
- Divide your target monthly income by your return: $10,000 ÷ 5% (0.05) = $200,000
- Conclusion: They need $200,000 worth of funding
They know the math, they know their figures, they stay loyal to their process, and they remove variability. That's how these traders get to $10,000 per month.
The Process Loyalty Checklist
Now let's walk through the exact checklist Pat created based on the best performing traders he's been exposed to at both FTMO and Telos Capital.
Test Your Process Loyalty
Check off the components you have. The ones you don't tick become critical areas to focus on in your trading.
When outcomes matter, do your rules stay identical?
- Same entry criteria when deep in drawdown?
- Same stop placement regardless of account status?
- Same percentage risk consistently?
- Same execution speed or do you hesitate?
- Same trade frequency or do you trade more/less?
Pressure moments that expose this: Drawdown, close to payout, close to daily loss limit, after big winning streak
✗ You fail if: You trade safe, hesitate, or add confirmation
✓ You pass if: Rules are identical regardless of P&L
Are all your decisions made before the trade exits?
- Entry: Predefined?
- Exit: Predefined?
- Invalidation: Predefined?
- Risk: Predefined?
You shouldn't be making rules and decisions when the trade is open. These should all be predefined in a mechanical trading plan. Then you just focus on executing those when more information arises.
✗ You fail if: You think, debate, or adjust mid-trade
✓ You pass if: You execute pre-decided actions without negotiation
Funded traders don't trade with willpower. They trade with pre-commitment.
After a loss, do you return to the process or try to fix the outcome?
- No urgency to make it back?
- No size increase?
- No rule changes?
- No forced trades?
- Clean reset before next setup?
✓ If you tick all those: You're in the best possible position to achieve $10,000 in payouts and get consistent funding
Reality Check: The market doesn't punish lack of knowledge. It punishes lack of process loyalty under pressure. If you can fix your process loyalty under pressure, you will significantly increase the chances of being a funded trader and getting consistent payouts and scaling to $10,000 per month.
Key Takeaways
- Process Loyalty Under Pressure is The Differentiator: Not discipline, not patience, not talent. The single trait that every funded trader at FTMO and Telos Capital shares is process loyalty when pressure hits.
- Pressure Reveals, It Doesn't Create: Pressure doesn't create mistakes—it reveals whether loyalty exists. Most traders know the rules. Funded traders obey them especially when it hurts most.
- Never Say "Just This Once": The moment you negotiate with your system, that bad habit creeps in. If you do it now, you'll do it again. Funded traders never widen stops, size up, hesitate on valid setups, or override processes based on P&L.
- Remove Variability to Hit $10K Monthly: Successful traders don't get caught in elations after overperforming quarters or depressions after underperforming ones. They know their mean return and expect reversion to it.
- Pride Promotes Greed, Shame Promotes Fear: When overperforming (pride), traders get sloppy and increase risk. When underperforming (shame), they promote fear. Stay balanced by understanding your mean.
- Calculate Your Required Capital: Target monthly income ÷ average monthly % return = required funding. For $10K monthly with 5% average return, you need $200,000 in funded capital.
- Rule Consistency Under Pressure: Your entry criteria, stop placement, risk percentage, execution speed, and trade frequency must stay identical whether in drawdown, close to payout, or after winning streaks.
- Trade With Pre-Commitment, Not Willpower: All decisions (entry, exit, invalidation, risk) must be predefined before trades open. Funded traders don't negotiate mid-trade—they execute pre-decided actions.
- Post-Loss Behavior Reveals Everything: After losses, funded traders return to process rather than trying to fix outcomes. No urgency to recover, no size increases, no rule changes, clean reset before next setup.
- Prop Firms Don't Fail Traders on Strategy: They fail traders based on breakdown under pressure. If you fail even one test of process loyalty, you're not failing on strategy—you're failing on execution under pressure.
The Bottom Line
If you fail even one of these tests, you're not failing on strategy—you're failing on execution under pressure. It's your loyalty under pressure, your loyalty to your process under pressure, that is the most important and distinguishing factor between traders who make it and those who don't.
The 5-second check isn't about technical analysis or strategy complexity. It's about one simple question: Does this trader remain loyal to their process when it hurts?
That's the trait. That's what separates funded traders pulling consistent $10,000 monthly payouts from those who blow account after account.
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